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Re: speed and velocity



Date: Sat, 5 Dec 1998 09:50:17 +1100
From: Brian McInnes <bmcinnes@PNC.COM.AU>

Phil,
Thanks for your detailed posting. I particularly
appreciated your final paragraph
I think the moral of the story is: vectors in 2 or more
dimensions are easier to understand because we use a special
notation for them ab initio; vectors in 1 dimension are confusing
because we don't see the need for a special notation until it's
too late. (And when we get it figured out, we don't need the
special notation -- and everybody gets it figured out well
enough to cope eventually, so why bother? Believe it or not,
the New Math of the '60s came largely from a desire to eliminate
such sources of confusion -- and there's still fallout from that
disaster.)
It's the figuring out by students that worries me.

Thanks for your kind words. I'm very glad I was able to say something
useful.
I wish we could all agree to use "vector i" in 1 dimension, just like
we use "vectors i and j" in 2 and "vectors i,j and k" in 3; I think it
would actually help students. But it's hard to justify teaching that
differs too much from the "real world" outside a classroom, especially
when it's a math class and we're always "too abstract." Now if the
trend started in physics and/or engineering and *math* changed "to
accomodate it" -- well, that would be a different story!
Most sincere wishes of Good Luck!

---------------------------------------------
Phil Parker pparker@twsuvm.uc.twsu.edu
Random quote for this second:
Nobody can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has
just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.
---Sydney Harris