| Why are engineers so fond of right angles? Who invented
engineering drawing anyway? I have a collection of felt-tip pens. Each
is five and a half inches long and half an inch in diameter. How many can
I pack into a four inch cube? It took two years of research and many hours
of computer processing to imitate successfully the distortions that Picasso
used in pictures like "La Coiffure". How did Picasso do it? Who was Hero
of Alexandria and for what is he best remembered? The ancient Romans were
fabulous architects and engineers. How did they manage ordinary arithmetic
with Roman numbers?
When you translate English into Japanese, the Japanese version is almost always longer. When you translate Japanese into English, the English version is longer. What does this tell you? When you read a mathematical proof you are obliged to accept that the result must be true given the starting assumptions. But some published proofs are long and later shown to contain mistakes. How can we know when something has been proved? I once knew a pianist who was so poor at her ordinary school work that it took three extra years and a great deal of special tuition to get her through basic English, maths, geography, history and French. She needed these five subjects before she could take up her scholarship at the RCM. Someone who can accompany a song by Schubert, transposing at sight because the singer cannot get the high notes, has already demonstrated enormous ability. How dare we judge people by mundane, standard tests? Is this a 3D Picture?  |