Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!torsqnt!tmsoft!masnet!rose!david.lloyd-jones
From: david.lloyd-jones@rose.uucp (DAVID LLOYD-JONES)
Newsgroups: comp.edu
Distribution: world
Subject: Subtle Math Questions
Message-ID: <f07a6214a644281afc84@rose.uucp>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 91  9:47:00 EST
Organization: Rose Media, ON, CANADA
Lines: 33

Replying to: shimeall@taurus.cs.nps.navy.mil (timothy shimeall)
>Orga: Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey CA
>
>Most of these questions have focussed on "puzzle-solving" as a
>measure of math ability.  Having the opportunity, I asked Richard
>Hamming (of Hamming codes, Hamming integral, Hamming integration
>method and Hamming primes fame...) the question of how to judge a
>person's math understanding.  He indicated that he wouldn't ask them to
>solve puzzles.  Instead, he'd ask them to define the field of
>mathmatics, the activities mathematicians perform and the skills
>needed by students of mathematics.
>
>The trick is, he isn't looking for any specific response.  He feels
>that if the respondent is able to put together ANY well-reasoned
>response, that would be sufficient.
>


There's a classic in this genre, one version of which is Seymour Papert
quoting an anonymous, but possibly existing, child in a Lawrence, Mass.,
school:  "There's two ways of doing anything, the smart way and the
dumb way.  When you do it the smart way, that's mathematics."

                            :-)

                                        -dlj.



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