{"id":7386,"date":"2013-05-10T02:05:26","date_gmt":"2013-05-10T06:05:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?p=7386"},"modified":"2013-05-10T02:05:26","modified_gmt":"2013-05-10T06:05:26","slug":"7-quick-takes-51013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2013\/05\/7-quick-takes-51013.html","title":{"rendered":"7 Quick Takes (5\/10\/13)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>\u2014 1 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

If I kept a gratitude journal, I\u2019d start every day\u2019s entry with \u201cI am grateful I\u2019m not in law school.\u201d \u00a0(I hear all the cool parts from my law schools friends or Law and the Multiverse<\/a>, anyway). \u00a0But, after seeing beckwithmw\u2019s visualization of thesis length by subject<\/a>, I\u2019m prepared to add my non-attendance at a lot more grad schools to a daily litany of thanks.<\/p>\n

<\/a>\u2014 2 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

The tails and travails of my friends were enough to keep me safe from these grad schools, but, if I noticed my will or good judgement slipping, \u00a0I could always try ringing up the people who made these Dutch safety warnings<\/a> to make me a personal motivational poster. \u00a0This one was my favorite:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>\u2014 3 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

One blog post I found electrifying (in the good way) this week was one of Chana Messinger\u2019s contributions to the SSA blogathon. \u00a0It\u2019s titled, \u201cMaaaaaaaaath<\/a>.\u201d \u00a0Frankly the title was enough for paroxyms of delight, but once I got my smelling salts and recovered enough to read on, it was all she had promised:<\/p>\n

[M]ath has a language, and it\u2019s not an easy one to learn. There are\u00a0all the symbols<\/a>, for one: numbers, logical operators, less than, more than, exponent, subscript, and on and on until you think you\u2019ll drown in them. And then there are the rules for how they fit together. This implies that. Why again? Oh yes, because this. And that makes sense because? Oh, right. But eventually, if you follow math far enough, you develop a deep respect for mathematical notation, its minimalism, its utility, and you begin to deeply distrust anyone who says, \u201cMath would be fun, but why are there so many symbols?\u201d (Though of course, there\u2019s\u00a0tons of math to be done without them<\/a>. You get to make the rules, remember?). But you also get to criticize notation, decide that some is better than others, and take sides on Newtonian vs Leibnizian differential notation.<\/p>\n

But because it is in some sense, a language, I wish it was taught like one. I wish that young children read proofs without fully understanding them, just as we are encouraged to read texts in Spanish without looking up every single word. I wish we contented ourselves with the gist of the proof, the point, so that we learned to prioritize the\u00a0meaning<\/em>\u00a0over the form, just as we may not be able to word-for-word translations of our French teacher\u2019s request, but we know it\u2019s time to sit down.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/a>\u2014 4 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

In order to get people excited about science a bit more briefly, students at the Albert Einstein Institute made\u00a0Game of Thrones<\/em>-style sigils for various scientists and projects<\/a>. \u00a0But you\u2019ll have to click through to see them, as I\u2019ve reserved this Take\u2019s image slot for the House Sigil a friend designed for me (in Slytherin colors, no less!)<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/a>\u2014 5 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

Oooh, and while we\u2019re getting excited about data analysis, have you seen the research a\u00a0physicist\u00a0did using the dollar bill tracking website Whereisgeorge.com<\/a>\u00a0to draw some non-state boundaries on the U.S. map<\/a>? \u00a0Think of the different sections as basins that dollars are much more likely to move around in than to move between.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a>\u2014 6 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

And also in the realm of fun analysis, Stephen Wolfram took apart a ream of data about facebook and has nice visualizations for<\/a>:<\/p>\n