Comments on: Quoted without comment

By: tdstephens3

tdstephens3 — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 04:31:59 +0000

…the context…results oriented programs will not “create” more mathematicians/scientists. The position of scientist requires far more than good test scores. Please pick up on this, the culture of the scientist is unique and poorly understood.

By: Walt

Walt — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 05:26:57 +0000

Jonathan: That’s like the greatest story ever. Clearly you were destined to double major solely so someone could say that to you someday. I see now that everything is foreordained.

By: Steve

Steve — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 19:32:30 +0000

Perhaps a response should be that as a Math major you understand the difference between discrete and continuous data, so as an English major you know that “10 items or less” is poor English.
(see Bad marks for Tesco near the bottom of http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1971445,00.html and Pedants’ revolt near the bottom of http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1971445,00.html )

By: Jonathan Vos Post

Jonathan Vos Post — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 18:16:02 +0000

As the owner of a rare double B.S. in Mathematics and English Literature from Caltech (1973), this notion struck home.

Not as painfully, I should add, as the time that I was at the “10 items or less” line at a Pasadena grocery store, with roughly 17 items plunked down near the cash register. I was wearing a Caltech sweatshirt.

“Are you an English Major who can’t count,” asked the cashier, “or a Math major who can’t read?”

By: michael

michael — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 20:55:32 +0000

I suppose that I would like them more if I were any good at them, but I am in Walt “adjoint functors are bunk” Pohl’s camp on this one.

By: Walt

Walt — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 15:29:19 +0000

I know this a minority opinion, but I don’t really like the idea of math competitions. I always refused to do things like the Putnam, for example. I don’t mind competition in general, but I dislike it for things of intrinsic importance.

By: Alexandre Borovik

Alexandre Borovik — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 08:49:36 +0000

I do not feel that the proportion set in the comment by tdstephens3 is well balanced. I would formulate it in a bit more careful way:

Mathematicians aren’t born from log table memorizing competitions in the same way that poets do not grow out of spelling bees.

Basically, spelling bees have nothing to do with poetry, while a decent maths competition problem most definitely belongs to mathematics.

And maths competitions are not spelling bees!

By: Mikael Johansson

Mikael Johansson — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 08:24:11 +0000

Also Terence Tao is famous for his history with and later engagement for the mathematical olympiads.

By: serg

serg — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 06:31:13 +0000

However Perelman had grown out of school math competitions and mathematical olympiads…