Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site ttidcc.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!ttidca!ttidcc!hollombe From: hollombe@ttidcc.UUCP (The Polymath) Newsgroups: net.singles Subject: Re: Re: Why take CALC (Blech!) Message-ID: <584@ttidcc.UUCP> Date: Mon, 22-Jul-85 15:04:41 EDT Article-I.D.: ttidcc.584 Posted: Mon Jul 22 15:04:41 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 24-Jul-85 06:32:42 EDT References: <1089@cae780.UUCP> <2700003@pbear.UUCP> Reply-To: hollombe@ttidcc.UUCP (The Polymath) Organization: The Cat Factory Lines: 51 Summary: In article <2700003@pbear.UUCP> peterb@pbear.UUCP writes: > > > It may sound suprising, but a lot of that calculus comes in quite >handy for comupter graphics. Yes, but what is computer graphics good for? (-: Actually, that's not surprising at all. I remember when I was teaching myself programming in college and a friend in the computer center mentioned his fantasy of plotting a human face in 3-D by taking elevation measurements for points in a square array (we had a very primitive 3-D grid plotting program running on a CDC 3300 at the time). My reaction was something like "Hmmm. A face is a very complex surface. Why not pick a part of the body that has smoother curves?". Thus was born the "boob" project. I learned a little about analytic geometry that summer, not to mention FORTRAN. The techs in charge of the plotter were very amused when the goal of the project started to become apparent on the plots. > ... You may bitch >and moan about it, but as they say, the more you learned, the more you can >do. I think that not wishing to learn calculus is taking the easy way out. As the person who started this whole discussion, I'd like to point out that, for me, it wasn't a matter of not wanting to learn calculus. I started calculus four times and dropped the course four times to avoid failing. Does that sound like I didn't want to learn it? I'll probably try again one of these days -- I don't give up easily. As I said, my lack of understanding of calculus hasn't noticeably affected my ability to perform all kinds of business, scientific, and systems programming and program design. Granted, there are some areas where it's required, and I don't work in those areas (I'd love to work with graphics ... ~sigh~). I have received numerous compliments (also raises and promotions) on the work I've done, so I don't think my disability with regard to calculus is any indication of a lack of necessary programming skills, abilities, thought processes, or what-have-you. Damn! I said I wasn't going to say anymore on this subject. Sorry about that. Back to work... -_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ The Polymath (aka: Jerry Hollombe) Citicorp TTI Common Sense is what tells you that a ten 3100 Ocean Park Blvd. pound weight falls ten times as fast as a Santa Monica, CA 90405 one pound weight. (213) 450-9111, ext. 2483 {philabs,randvax,trwrb,vortex}!ttidca!ttidcc!hollombe