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juldeaWell, second day of classes today. Had discrete math and German. Turns out that Brian is in my section of discrete, yay! And we got the GOOD teacher. He seems really cool. The class is going to have lots of logic and proofs in it! I'm so excited!
The only problem with the class is the way he asks in-class questions. He has a deck of cards with people's names on them and each time he has a question he draws a name and asks them. Now, I would be all cool with that, if the class weren't full of damned idiots. It is really difficult for me to sit quiet when there is a simple question being asked and person after person refuses to use their brains and answer it.
Example:
He posed this question in class, as part of a larger logic puzzle. The puzzle states that there are 3 doors... behind one is a million dollars, behind another is a palm pilot, and behind the last is a melting popsicle. Each door has a sign on it. The sign on the door with the million behind it is true, and the sign on the door with the popsicle behind it is false. The sign on the first door says "Palm is here", the sign on the second door says "Popsicle is behind door 3" and the sign on the third door says "Palm is behind door 1". Now, he walked people through the logic of why the million dollars could not be behind door 1. Then he asked why it couldn't be behind door 2. Maybe I'm just good at this stuff, but it took me just a short bit of thinking to reason it out. He asked about 4 different people this, and none of them could answer. They giggled and laughed at their own stupidity and none of them even THOUGHT about it, they just stared blankly and since the answer wasn't fed to them they didn't understand. Finally I had enough and raised my hand... I guess he had had enough too because he let me explain it.
Maybe I'm a bitchy snob, but I expect people to at least try to use their brains in class. =P
Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what that class offers.
German was boring. If it weren't the last german I have to take, I think I'd drop it. It'll be a lot of busywork and I will learn things I don't know and get better at the language, but I'm pretty uncaring about that right now. Oh well.
So now I'm at work, eating Goldfish (actually I need to pack those up now, eating too many!) and mudding and talking at all of you. Maybe the day will get more exciting somehow.
The only problem with the class is the way he asks in-class questions. He has a deck of cards with people's names on them and each time he has a question he draws a name and asks them. Now, I would be all cool with that, if the class weren't full of damned idiots. It is really difficult for me to sit quiet when there is a simple question being asked and person after person refuses to use their brains and answer it.
Example:
He posed this question in class, as part of a larger logic puzzle. The puzzle states that there are 3 doors... behind one is a million dollars, behind another is a palm pilot, and behind the last is a melting popsicle. Each door has a sign on it. The sign on the door with the million behind it is true, and the sign on the door with the popsicle behind it is false. The sign on the first door says "Palm is here", the sign on the second door says "Popsicle is behind door 3" and the sign on the third door says "Palm is behind door 1". Now, he walked people through the logic of why the million dollars could not be behind door 1. Then he asked why it couldn't be behind door 2. Maybe I'm just good at this stuff, but it took me just a short bit of thinking to reason it out. He asked about 4 different people this, and none of them could answer. They giggled and laughed at their own stupidity and none of them even THOUGHT about it, they just stared blankly and since the answer wasn't fed to them they didn't understand. Finally I had enough and raised my hand... I guess he had had enough too because he let me explain it.
Maybe I'm a bitchy snob, but I expect people to at least try to use their brains in class. =P
Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what that class offers.
German was boring. If it weren't the last german I have to take, I think I'd drop it. It'll be a lot of busywork and I will learn things I don't know and get better at the language, but I'm pretty uncaring about that right now. Oh well.
So now I'm at work, eating Goldfish (actually I need to pack those up now, eating too many!) and mudding and talking at all of you. Maybe the day will get more exciting somehow.
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Re:
on 21 Aug 2001 16:42 (UTC)no subject
on 21 Aug 2001 17:02 (UTC)no subject
on 21 Aug 2001 17:08 (UTC)If the money were behind door #1, then the sign on door #1 would have to be true. However, the sign on door #1 says that the palm pilot is there, and that is a false statement. Therefore, the $$ cannot be behind door #1.
If the money were behind door #2, then the sign on that door would have to be true. Therefore, the popsicle would be behind door #3, and the palm pilot would be behind door #1. Since the popsicle is behind door #3, the sign on that door has to be false. However, the sign says that the palm pilot is behind door #1, and that is a true statement. There's another contradicion, so the money can't be behind door #2.
I didn't use any modus tollens or impressive words there. I just looked at statements and their consequences. I don't see how anyone needs any extra background in that... just the desire to follow out a path of reasoning.
no subject
on 21 Aug 2001 17:21 (UTC)Re:
on 21 Aug 2001 17:26 (UTC)Reading back, I didn't say that in the best way in the original description. Maybe that's our communication problem. =P
no subject
on 23 Aug 2001 02:39 (UTC)Re:
on 23 Aug 2001 10:40 (UTC)Are you referring to me, or your old prof? heh