elg@killer.UUCP (04/20/87)
Barry Shein mentions that "Copying a bubblesort out of ACM algorithms
is not innovation". Someone else mentions a case where a student was
influenced by a partial program in another algorithms book.
First, we have to figure out what we're here to do. If the person knows enough
to get ACM algorithms to get a bubblesort, then when the person is on the job
and needs a bubblesort, he can just pick up ACM algorithms. Most "Computer
Science" majors are involved in writing programs, except for a few cloistered
PhDs who do "pure research" (and usually are never heard from, except for
unreadable journal articles in obscure journals). So the purpose is twofold:
learn what a computer program IS (the "science"), and WRITE the silly things.
Such as, perhaps, a physicist discovering how to describe a physical principle,
and a mechanaical engineer creating an object taking advantage of that
principle.
In other words, the whole purpose of the thing is to get the program written.
While copying your friend's program isn't writing and thus is cheating,
looking up resources IS part of the writing process.
As well as being a student, I am a part-time programmer for a small firm that
produces telecommunications specialty software (e.g. a remotely-altered store
display, transmitting color radar graphics & displaying them, etc.). When I
need something, such as, perhaps, an Xmodem routine for transmitting the data,
I'm sure the heck not going to invent Yet Another Xmodem.... I'm going to use
one of the existing ones. For another example, when I needed to do some
hashing, I consulted Knuth. The job needed doing. The job needed doing RIGHT.
Without spending 6 months working through the math (assuming that I had the
Statistics background to do it at all). The way to do it right, in the case of
a well-known problem with a well-known solution, is to look it up -- there is
generally no reason to re-invent the wheel. If the solution takes up a lot of
time or space, THEN you look for a better solution, and do that "innovating".
But when you have a job to do, you save the time-consuming innovation part of
the job for the parts of the job that really need it, that are not formalized,
and leave the stock-standard stuff alone. Heck, if you have the proper
theoretical background, you can perhaps even write a paper about your solution
and its theoretical generalization & formalization.... I suspect that this is
the way that a LOT of innovation gets done in the Computer Science area.
I'm curious: What do you academicians do when you recieve a program from a
student that cites Saint Knuth on several important algorithms? Medal of
Honor? or firing squad?
--
Eric Green elg%usl.CSNET Hacker-in-training, University of SW Louisiana
{cbosgd,ihnp4}!killer!elg
Snail Mail P.O. Box 92191 Bayou ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lafayette, LA 70509 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Telecommunicationstlh@arthur.cs.purdue.edu.UUCP (04/22/87)
In article <780@killer.UUCP>, elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) writes: > Barry Shein mentions that "Copying a bubblesort out of ACM algorithms > is not innovation". Someone else mentions a case where a student was > influenced by a partial program in another algorithms book. > [portion deleted] > > In other words, the whole purpose of the thing is to get the program written. > While copying your friend's program isn't writing and thus is cheating, > looking up resources IS part of the writing process. > [portion deleted] > > I'm curious: What do you academicians do when you recieve a program from a > student that cites Saint Knuth on several important algorithms? Medal of > Honor? or firing squad? > -- > Eric Green elg%usl.CSNET Hacker-in-training, University of SW Louisiana > {cbosgd,ihnp4}!killer!elg > Snail Mail P.O. Box 92191 Bayou ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > Lafayette, LA 70509 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Telecommunications When designing an assignment for a class that I am teaching, I design it with the intent that the student will invest some creative energy into formulating a clear understanding of the problem and then developing their own solution. I do this because it is my philosophy that CSE is primarily developing problem solving skills and not teaching how to program. Admittedly, the first courses in a CS curriculum end up being courses that teach specific languages and programming techniques. But when a student has finished my course I like to think that I have given that student more than a proficiency in Pascal, I like to think that student has gained some confidence in his/her ability to look at problem (not just a programming assignment!) and develop a solution. If faced with a student who turns in a working program with an attached note indicating that it has been copied, not from a fellow student, but from a source, I would compliment the student's integrity, STRONGLY discourage the behavior in oral communication and depending on how heavily the student relied on the outside source, correspondingly reduce the student's score on the assignment. In short, looking up solutions (in my book) is not cheating but it is circumventing the purpose of assignments. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thomas L. Hausmann | Research Assistant (now) | tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu ( ARPA ) Dept of Computer Science | Purdue University | ...!purdue!tlh ( UUCP ) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
chris@mimsy.UUCP (04/22/87)
In article <780@killer.UUCP> elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) writes: >Barry Shein mentions that "Copying a bubblesort out of ACM algorithms >is not innovation". Someone else mentions a case where a student was >influenced by a partial program in another algorithms book. > >First, we have to figure out what we're here to do. In the case mentioned by Barry Shein, the students were no doubt supposed to do one or more of these: learn a language; learn about sorting; learn how bubble sorts are implemented. Copying the algorithm from a book is not a particularly good way to do these. (Not that it can never work. One can learn quite a bit simply by reading.) >In other words, the whole purpose of the thing is to get the program >written. Not in this case. >... For another example, when [working for a company] I needed to do >some hashing, I consulted Knuth. The job needed doing. The job needed >doing RIGHT. Without spending 6 months working through the math >(assuming that I had the Statistics background to do it at all). >The way to do it right, in the case of a well-known problem with a >well-known solution, is to look it up -- there is generally no reason >to re-invent the wheel. But first you must know that the wheel has been invented. How did you know you needed hashing? How did you know to use Knuth? Of all those hashing algorithms Knuth presents, how can you tell which one to use? Of course, this can be carried to an arbitrary depth (`How did you know you needed to write that particular program in the first place?', etc., ad absurdum nauseamque). The point, though, is that you have to know where to start when solving a problem. The more you know, the less chance there is that you will waste time solving the wrong problems---inventing square wheels, or copying round pegs only to put them into triangular holes. Aside: One of the things I dislike about the traditional school environment is that it assumes a linear approach to learning---that you should start with something small and very basic, then build on that, and keep building until you reach the state of the art and begin innovating. This approach is fine: it works, and it does not have to be boring. But it is not the only approach. One can also dive off the deep end, and sink or swim. I have done this with some of my own hobby-interests (e.g., digital electronics, when I was in junior high and high school). Sometimes one sinks; and if not, one's swimming ability is hard to judge, if only because the gradual approach is more common and familiar. To climb out of the metaphorical pool, it is conceivable that someone might pick up Knuth's books and learn quite a bit about computing, without ever having touched a digital computer. This person might well have a terrible time afterward in a regular curriculum. All the beginning classes would be terribly boring. This is why I believe that the ideal school is a log with a teacher on one end and a student on the other. (Incidentally, if we are going to argue about plagiarism, can we at least spell it correctly? Everyone seems to have copied the wrong spelling from the previous poster. :-) ) -- In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 7690) UUCP: seismo!mimsy!chris ARPA/CSNet: chris@mimsy.umd.edu
bzs@bu-cs.UUCP (04/22/87)
From: elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) >First, we have to figure out what we're here to do. If the person knows enough >to get ACM algorithms to get a bubblesort, then when the person is on the job >and needs a bubblesort, he can just pick up ACM algorithms. ... >In other words, the whole purpose of the thing is to get the program written. No, no, no, no, no, a thousand times, no. If the whole purpose of the thing is to get the program written I would write it myself. I certainly do not need 40 copies of a bubble sort algorithm written by freshmen, trust me. Or perhaps *I* would copy it out of a book. The whole purpose of the thing is to LEARN SOMETHING! That's why you are in college. Why is this concept too subtle for some people to grasp? In math you work math problems which you can probably find solutions to right in the back of the book. Does this mean you should just copy the answers out of the back of the book because that's what a "real" mathematician would do? That's absurd. The point is to get practice in thinking through problems yourself, within a very artificial setting that has been tuned to your level of training. If we gave intro students (after all, who could an assgt to write a bubble-sort be for?) original problems who's answers were not published they would (almost) all drop dead on the spot. So what do we have to do? Manufacture artificial problems that we are quite sure are of the right challenge level just to make it impossible to copy them out of a book? How useful are these problems going to be? How much are they going to reflect the whims of the instructor's interests? (gee, you shoulda been in my Real Analysis course...) Yes, it is useful, nay, critical, to know how to use reference materials to solve problems by the time you get out of an undergraduate CS program. No argument. But it is also useful to learn how to solve problems yourself because: WHEN IT COMES TO REAL LIFE YOU CAN'T ALWAYS LOOK IN THE BACK OF THE BOOK! All you are asked to do is to determine when it is appropriate to use outside materials and when it is appropriate to work a problem entirely on your own (typically using a text.) If you have any question as to which is which, ask your instructor. I am sure s/he will know. Think about it, why does a person jog when they can obviously get where they are going faster in a car? -Barry Shein, Boston University
elg@killer.UUCP (04/26/87)
in article <1262@arthur.cs.purdue.edu>, tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu (Thomas L. Hausmann) says: > In article <780@killer.UUCP>, elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) writes: >> I'm curious: What do you academicians do when you recieve a program from a >> student that cites Saint Knuth on several important algorithms? Medal of >> Honor? or firing squad? > But when a student has finished my course I like to think that I have given > that student more than a proficiency in Pascal, I like to think that > student has gained some confidence in his/her ability to look at problem > (not just a programming assignment!) and develop a solution. > In short, looking up solutions (in my book) > is not cheating but it is circumventing the purpose of assignments. I think it's impossible to "copy programs out of books" (as Barry Shein puts it). They have to understand the problem, and have at least a LITTLE idea of what the solution is, in order to integrate the information in the book into their program. After all, do you REALLY want your 2nd semester CS students to re-invent sorting, without you telling them about bubble sorts or quicksort? Isn't TELLING them about bubble sorts and quicksort, the same as them looking it up in a book in the library? I don't know about you, but my instructor spent 2 lectures disecting the quicksort algorithm, line by line, and then gave us a programming assignment telling us to devise several ways of choosing a median value, and see how much time kicking in an insertion sort on small partition sizes would save, and print out performance data to see which was more efficient... seems to be the same kind of stuff that anything you can look up in the library would do, is there some magic formula that makes it OK for the instructor to do it, but NOT ok for you to look up a book that does it? Or is it just that instructors are too lazy to think up of assignments where you can't possibly copy from a source without thoroughly understanding the concepts involved? By the way, anybody capable of translating Knuth's MIX algorithms into Pascal, is a better programmer than me :-). And certainly is going to understand the solution VERY well, not just be parroting a solution. About the only thing you're going to get out of Knuth, in most cases, is CONCEPTS. Exactly what the instructor is supposed to be teaching you. Not to mention that, in most cases, Knuth does a complete analysis of time complexity etc... enough to make a 2nd semester CS student say "GOSH! There's more to CS than just programming!". There is also the problem of people who have done the particular type of algorithm before. For example, several programs that I've written have used a hash table to do fast lookups of either integers or identifiers. An instructor assigned me a program where I had to implement several types of hashing & re-hashing, in order to gather some empirical data about which one was the most effective in hashing a certain identifier set (all identifiers in a system program). I'd looked up Knuth after my first attempt at hashing ended up with a very poor distribution (turns out that it was the size of my hash table that was the culprit -- after fixing that, all ended well). Now, comes the hard part: How do I acknowledge that I did NOT invent hashing and that I did, in fact, learn most of the concepts & was much influenced by Knuth and some of the Unix stuff (oops, there I go looking at the sources again)? Particularly, the hash table size, which he asked us to look at and find an optimal size, and write about WHY that size was best? I'm in trouble here, right, since I already know that a prime number is best? Seems that the best solution, in my case, is to keep my mouth shut, because CS instructors have no sympathy for such cases, judging from the three responses to my original bulletin.... students are supposed to be illiterate, and are supposed to do no outside work, and are supposed to learn only what's taught in class, seems to be the message. And when the contrary is true, the message seems to be keep your mouth shut and pretend that you're just another ignorant undergrad.... Eric -- Eric Green elg%usl.CSNET "Just an undergrad" CS student, USL {cbosgd,ihnp4}!killer!elg Haquer, Bayou Telecommunications Snail Mail P.O. Box 92191 BBS phone #: 318-984-3854 300/1200 baud Lafayette, LA 70509 Clever quote goes here, but I'm too exhausted.
djw@a.UUCP (David Wade, Neutron Measurements Group, Computer Abuser ) (04/30/87)
> > When designing an assignment for a class that I am teaching, ... > I do this because it is my philosophy that CSE > is primarily developing problem solving skills and not teaching how to > program. I believe that something is missing here... 1) do you have the kind of equipment that I will need after school? 2) do you have the language I will need after school? 3) do you understand the marketplace I will be entering OR are you educating me for a particular job? After all; you wouldn't teach a locksmith without having locks around. And, since I've been paid as a programmer/analyst for over 17 years, I wonder why the schools are turning out brain-damaged graduates. Not that it is really their fault, but just in case you have been paying attention, ALL OF THE CURRENT PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES ARE TEACHING YOU TO THINK IN A WAY THAT WON'T HELP YOU ON THE NEXT GENERATION OF MAINFRAMES. Here in Los Alamos we usually have fast computers. We tend to have a reasonable collection of "new" computers. We recently changed the direction we were going with respect to the "hypercube" because of something I'm not qualified to tell you, but we still have a "Hypercube" around. And we have a CrayXMP48. Please explain to me which of your classes emphasizes that I be writing in a lauguage which does 256 independent tasks concurrently. """""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" That's important, folks! I expect to see micro-clusters in home computers before many of you reading this graduate. How many of you can even conceive of a program which does 4 different program tasks, concurrently? The Cray will give you its 4 CPU's if you ask for them corrrectly, now! This stuff is real! The Hypercube has 256 separate CPU's working on your program independently. When you get a bug, which stack are you going to check? How are you going to write a bubblesort for a machine which uses 256 separate/ independent CPUs? Perhaps the fact that the student (who was advocating leniency for student cheaters) couldn't spell plagiarize, didn't use punctuation, and wrote as though he were a 9-year old; doesn't really matter. His training at your school's hands will merely give him an earlier chance at the queue awaiting their chance to write a program on a machine which processes data in a matter fundamentally alien to the currently taught curriculum. Perhaps it is time that we force CS students to read about general semantics? Perhaps we can screen out Aristotelian thinking in our Computer Science Departments? But then Computer Science would start to look like the Philosophy Department. Perhaps that's wise, we could change its name to Philosophistry... Meaning no real harm, Dave Wade
tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu (Thomas L. Hausmann) (05/03/87)
In article <170@a.UUCP>, djw@a.UUCP (David Wade, Neutron Measurements Group, Computer Abuser ) writes: > > > > When designing an assignment for a class that I am teaching, ... > > I do this because it is my philosophy that CSE > > is primarily developing problem solving skills and not teaching how to > > program. > I believe that something is missing here... > > 1) do you have the kind of equipment that I will need after school? > 2) do you have the language I will need after school? > 3) do you understand the marketplace I will be entering OR are > you educating me for a particular job? > After all; you wouldn't teach a locksmith without having locks around. > And, since I've been paid as a programmer/analyst for over 17 years, I > wonder why the schools are turning out brain-damaged graduates. If you want go to school soley to get job training, go to a vocational school. It is not my job to educate students with knowledge that is outdated before they this institution. I don't know what Wade means by brain-damaged graduates (maybe they can't hack RPGII in their sleep or something. ;-)) Face it Wade, it is (in my opinion) not a University's purpose to focus education on job specific skills. (Of course, CS students learn to program, just like engineers learn calculus.) If a person has developed good problem solving skills independent of programming languages and architectures the transition to new languages and architectures is much easier than for the person who has done all their work/education in one language and machine architecture (obviously). That is why I am surprised at your questions above Wade, you and I are both aware that in this field we are always having to learn new things. No one could teach you about writing concurrent programs 17 years ago. And this is my point, I try to teach students how to THINK because I cannot tell them about all the equipment, languages, and architectures they will be using 4, 17, or 30 years from now. What I can do is invite students to some of the seminars and talks that are always going on in the department in order for them to see genuinely new things which may not ever be taught in a class for several more years. I have done this and the students said their minds were blown but at least they had the exposure. Striking a balance between gymnatics and music (now that the weather is nice.) Tom ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thomas L. Hausmann | Graduate Assistant | tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu ( ARPA ) Dept of Computer Science | Purdue University | ...!purdue!tlh ( UUCP ) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu (Thomas L. Hausmann) (05/03/87)
>in article <1262@arthur.cs.purdue.edu>, tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu (Thomas L. Hausmann) says: >> In article <780@killer.UUCP>, elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) writes: >>> I'm curious: What do you academicians ... >> ...In short, looking up solutions (in my book) >> is not cheating but it is circumventing the purpose of assignments. > >Isn't TELLING them about bubble sorts and quicksort, the same as them looking >it up in a book in the library? No, it isn't. Refer to the quicksort algorithm on p 94 of AHU. This is how I specified the quicksort algorithm to my class. The algorithm is short and easily stated, but when you implement quicksort you have to Micky-Mouse around to perform the partitioning. Now IF I were to assign a program like this, one of the things the student would get out of the assignment is that easily stated algorithms often mask cumbersome implementation details. > I don't know about you, but my instructor >spent 2 lectures disecting the quicksort algorithm, line by line, and then >gave us a programming assignment telling us to devise several ways of choosing >a median value, and see how much time kicking in an insertion sort on small >partition sizes would save, and print out performance data to see which was >more efficient... seems to be the same kind of stuff that anything you can >look up in the library would do, Perhaps your instructor wanted you to look at a large amount of data and make a few guesses and then run your program on a few more times or verify your guesses mathematically. Okay, so it's been done for quicksort, but down the road Eric, your going to have to be able to look back at your programs and find ways of making them more efficient and quite possibly this was one of the goals of the assignment. > ... students are supposed to be illiterate, and are supposed to do >no outside work, and are supposed to learn only what's taught in class, seems >to be the message. This is obviously not the case. Being able to use references is a good skill, sometimes it's more instructive to figure things out for yourself. >Eric Tom ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thomas L. Hausmann | Graduate Assistant | tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu ( ARPA ) Dept of Computer Science | Purdue University | ...!purdue!tlh ( UUCP ) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
gilbert@aimmi.UUCP (Gilbert Cockton) (05/04/87)
In article <170@a.UUCP> djw@a.UUCP (Dave Wade) writes: > >Perhaps it is time that we force CS students to read about general >semantics? Perhaps we can screen out Aristotelian thinking in our >Computer Science Departments? But then Computer Science would >start to look like the Philosophy Department. Perhaps that's >wise, we could change its name to Philosophistry... > I've been led into this line of reasoning whenever I consider the problem of CS graduates being asked to handle problems for which they do not have the right sort of attitudes and intellectual approaches. However, I really do doubt whether we could really effectively expand the disciplines taught to CS undergraduates. In the UK, most students are narrow specialists by the age of 18, so it would only be cruel making them think philosophically, write elegantly, reason with humility and enquire into the appropriate body of knowledge before programming their amateur AI programs or reinventing graphic design. Few of these skills count for anything in the maths and science subjects which most of them have studied at high school level. Instead they are force fed from cookbooks and pushed into the narrow epistemologies of mathematical logic, 2-variable experimental method and seat of the pants modeling techniques. It would seem more sensible to regard CS graduates as highly skilled doers and fixers, the craftsmen rather than the designers of IT, and to recruit additional graduates for more abstract and conceptual work. There is a tendency to ask too much of technically trained people who do what they have been trained to do well, and to ask them to develop skills, self-taught and with no humbling peer criticism, which already exist elsewhere. No-one round here heard of division of labour? There are now many people who have studied some computing, but whose main subject could not be studied at all without a high degree of intellectual flexibility, imaginative hypothesis generation and a sound exposure to those nasty philosophical problems that just can't be programmed away. And what's more they can write about them without slavish addiction to the nonsense of technical writing pundits (no passives! - 17 word sentences - who are these cultural vandals?). What many can't do is finish a dull, fiddly and technically intricate task - this is where you need your craftsmen. -- Gilbert Cockton, Scottish HCI Centre, Ben Line Building, Edinburgh, EH1 1TN JANET: gilbert@uk.ac.hw.aimmi ARPA: gilbert%aimmi.hw.ac.uk@cs.ucl.ac.uk UUCP: ..!{backbone}!aimmi.hw.ac.uk!gilbert
chris@mimsy.UUCP (05/06/87)
In article <5@aimmi.UUCP> gilbert@aimmi.UUCP (Gilbert Cockton) writes: >... they can write about them without slavish addiction to the >nonsense of technical writing pundits (no passives! - 17 word >sentences - who are these cultural vandals?). Passive sentences have been known to be useful. :-) `I am not a crook.' :-) -- In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 7690) Domain: chris@mimsy.umd.edu Path: seismo!mimsy!chris
elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) (05/06/87)
Sorry about the high flammables content of my last posting... disdvantage of
doing all my netreading/netposting after midnight (I tend to get a bit giddy
around 2am :-).
Points:
1) You are not going to teach a person how to think by denying him access to
necessary resources. I believe this was one of the justifications used in the
past for denial of computer resources to CS students: "If they have to
scribble it down in pencil and paper and then type it onto punch cards,
they'll have to think about the problem more."
2) Your typical teen-age hacker type can knock down quicksorts all day long
without pausing for breath, much less having to think. Telling him to not run
to the library isn't going to make any difference. You are not going to teach
innovation or "how to think" in a lower level CS class. Many students will
memorize solutions. The hacker folk don't need to memorize solutions. In any
event, almost nobody will listen to a darn thing said in early "program
design" or "data structures" or "structured programming" classes until they
tackle their first real project.... something that they CAN'T look up in a
book, and that all the memorization and parroting in the world won't help. And
something where the hacker's hackerisms turn grotesque, unwieldy, and
transparent.
For example, if you really want to see a bunch of kids a'frenzied, tell them
to write an EGREP program, and point them towards various books about discrete
math, formal languages, and parsing. Next, ask them to explain what they've
done, as formally as possible :-). You'll see'em doodling transition diagrams
on the backs of napkins while they're eating for the next month. To be fair,
though, that's really something for upperclassmen who'd have the necessary
mathematical background...
If a student types in a program out of a book, that's obviously "cheating".
However, when used properly, a book can help a student understand the
reasonings and principles behind a solution. Is not that understanding, a
step toward the road of actually being able to independently develop such
solutions?
--
Eric Green elg%usl.CSNET CS student, University of SW Louisiana
{cbosgd,ihnp4}!killer!elg Apprentice Haquer, Bayou Telecommunications
Snail Mail P.O. Box 92191 BBS phone #: 318-984-3854 300/1200 baud
Lafayette, LA 70509 I disclaim my existence, and yours, too.tim@praxis.UUCP (05/07/87)
In article <5@aimmi.UUCP> gilbert@aimmi.UUCP (Gilbert Cockton) writes: > I've been led into this line of reasoning whenever I consider the You don't mention whether you refer to the 'line' of reasoning which precedes your diatribe or the 'line' of reasoning which constitutes it. Neither is continuous enough to be recognisably a line. > However, I really do doubt whether we could really effectively expand > the disciplines taught to CS undergraduates. In the UK, most students > are narrow specialists by the age of 18, so it would only be cruel > making them think philosophically, write elegantly, reason with humility and > enquire into the appropriate body of knowledge ... Presumably you enquired into the body of knowledge dealing with psychological profiles of all 18-year-old students before writing this carefully-considered summary. Did you also take a dip in the pool of humility? I doubt it. > ... and with no humbling peer criticism, which already exist elsewhere. The humbling peer criticism has obviously had its effect on you. Do you realise how silly this talk of humility looks in the context of the rest of the article? > > There are now many people who have studied some computing, but whose > main subject could not be studied at all without a high degree of > intellectual flexibility, imaginative hypothesis generation and a > sound exposure to those nasty philosophical problems that just can't > be programmed away. ... So what do you want, a round of applause? People who try for philosophy degrees do so because they are inclined to think abstractly ( forgive the generalisation, I haven't asked them all, this is only my surmise ). That does not mean that they are all best suited to that style of thought. Some may be attracted by the two-paragraph sentence as a means of self-expression and be disappointed to be asked to think about tableness. Nor does that mean they won't get their degrees. And what is a degree? Three years of your life. If you're burned out after that why does any of us go on? After age 21, do we all stop being trainable? Oh, woe! Why don't I take myself out and shoot myself? Why, because I don't have that skill. > slavish addiction to the nonsense of technical writing pundits (no > passives! - 17 word sentences - who are these cultural vandals?). They are people who understand what they are going to write about and don't object to letting other people understand too. In fact they are so confident of their understanding that they will set it out in clear language to allow it to be criticised more easily by others. There is a difference between the sort of wording that wins Booker Prizes and the sort that communicates technical ideas. > What many can't do is finish a dull, fiddly and technically intricate > task - this is where you need your craftsmen. This last sentence sums up the whole article. We may have been privileged to see the emergence on the net of intellectual racism. Perhaps, though, the article can be attributed to a blind rage at the other article. I didn't read it but judging from the paragraph quoted it appears to be a shot across the bows from the 'Realprogrammerupuntiltwo- everymorningtakescoffeeIVandeatstwokilosofchocolateadayandsixburgersbefore- writinganoperatingsysteminmachinecodeandentersitbywhistlingdownaphoneline' faction of software engineers. Can a philosophy-with-computing ( another guess ) graduate be driven into a rage? Surely not. Well, I can't lay bricks. Does this mean that bricklayers as a race are the sublime pinnacle of pure intellect, or that they're the pits? Neither. It means I'll never earn a crust laying bricks. No smileys. If you don't mean it you won't say it. Tim M. -- Tim Magee. I[}}}]){{]]{{{(()((}})){{(){{(}}]){{{{{}}[[}}]){{{[]{{{{{}}}]. Charles Schulz points out that there is a difference between a good philosophy of life and a good bumper sticker.
tlh@arthur.cs.purdue.edu.UUCP (05/11/87)
In article <852@killer.UUCP>, elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) writes: > You are not going to teach a person how to think by denying him access to > necessary resources. > [ large portion deleted ] > If a student types in a program out of a book, that's obviously "cheating". > However, when used properly, a book can help a student understand the > reasonings and principles behind a solution. Exactly, that is what I have been saying for two weeks. > Is not that understanding, a > step toward the road of actually being able to independently develop such > solutions? Understanding, yes, but independent development of ideas is "painful" in the sense that it requires creativity, something that (possibly) cannot be taught but can be encouraged! Asking students not to run to the reference books to do their homework is like assigning calc problems when some of the answers are in the back. It is not "denying access to resources" as Eric suggests. > Eric Green elg%usl.CSNET > {cbosgd,ihnp4}!killer!elg Tom P.S. Perhaps further dicussions on this issue can be done via email now. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thomas L. Hausmann | Graduate Assistant | tlh@mordred.cs.purdue.edu ( ARPA ) Dept of Computer Science | Purdue University | ...!purdue!tlh ( UUCP ) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------