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"If you're not scientifically literate, in a way, you're disenfranchising yourself."
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"Why do we care about poor little Spirit?
A robot is shutting down; why all the fuss?
My theory, assuming you might want to hear it--
It's not just a bot: it's a real part of us." -
"It is not unusual that a single example or a very few shape an entire mathematical discipline. Can you give examples for such examples?
I'd love to learn about further basic or central examples and I think such examples serve as good invitations to various areas.
I asked this question over mathoverflow and it yielded around 100 examples. They are not equally fundamental and they are not equally suitable to be regarded as "examples," but overall it is a very good list. If you see some important example missing please, please add it. Here are the examples classified to areas. "
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"Essentially the problem is that the people on the panel have internalized the principles of comparative advantage and free trade to the point at which they are more or less incapable of thinking any other way. In a Ricardian world it makes sense for Ohio to overwhelmingly grow corn and soy, since growing corn and soy is what it does best. And because of economies of scale, it makes sense to grow just one type of each, on farms of mind-boggling size. Ohio can then trade all that corn and soy for the food it wants to eat, and everybody is better off.
Except in reality it doesn't work like that. "
More like this
The following is a collection of some of my posts that can be put into a simple and quick textbook-type thingy. I am not really sure you would call this a textbook, but maybe you would.
You all know the score.
Pimm thinks that
Example 1: A significant portion of my students address me as "Mrs. ScienceWoman" despite my repeated email signatures, etc. to the contrary. On the other hand, the lecturer with an M.S. next door to me is constantly addressed as "Dr. Lecturer." Guess what gender "Dr. Lecturer" is?
I enjoyed the fact that it was Felix Salomon who said this: "Essentially the problem is that the people on the panel have internalized the principles of comparative advantage and free trade to the point at which they are more or less incapable of thinking any other way."
I doubt that 5% of humanity has really internalized the principle of comparative advantage. Felix Salomon is perhaps in the 0.1% who have internalized the principle, and come out the other side, to a more sophisticated understanding of the world.