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Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

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Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#251

Post by tigerente »

MR4D wrote: post #101
Retric wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO, the point of textbooks is to educate people on some topic so making them as easy as possible seems like the correct choice. Outside of competitions, the value most people get from those courses is what them remember in 5+ years when their working not really the kind of symbol manipulation that makes can make things opaque. That said, soviet style education produced a lot of great mathematicians especially relati…

Somewhat cynically, I think the point of many textbooks is to make money for the authors. There is no reason why a calculus book needs to cost $200 (in the 1990’s) and get refreshed every 2-3 years. That subject has been known for hundreds of years and they rob poor engineering and science student of that $200. Sorry, I just have a bad taste in my mouth from crap like that in undergrad. Not saying you’re wrong, just…

No, almost nothing of the $200 actually goes to the author. A typical share goes like this: (concrete numbers for Germany) 50% of the sticker price goes to the book seller, 7% to tax, the remainder to printing, typesetting, logistics, the publishing house etc.

A typical author would get somewhere between 4-7% of the net sales. Most books, especially advanced science books, on the market (not your College 101, not NYT bestsellers) sell only in the order of hundreds, maybe a few thousand copies. The vast majority of books doesn't even earn the advance back. The reason why they are often not good, is that it takes months to write 500 pages of well-thought out, well-delivered material, and the incentive to do that for $5000 is relatively low.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#253

Post by concordDance »

TimTheTinker wrote: post #229
burtness wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By CRT are you referring to Critical Race Theory? I'm sceptical that its both that influential, or that any good faith reading of CRT supports sacrificing accelerated programs. In particular CRT in education if anything pushes against reliance on standardized testing scores.

Yes, that’s what I meant (and I for intersectionality). Agreed that CRT/I would oppose standardized tests, but that’s only because CRT/I at its core opposes anything objective. And the philosophy of CRT/I has already made significant inroads in American culture. Witness all the accelerated programs that have been shut down, the many recent attacks on objective standards—all in the name of “equity” (which does not mea…

Examples would be good.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#254

Post by emteycz »

de_watcher wrote: post #218
Endlessly wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious, what do you and your peers that were feed into a well defined path so early make of it now understanding that is not how all children reach advanced skills in mathematics?

Most of the children don't want, don't care or just plain stupid to be able to grasp the subjects. It makes sense to isolate together those who can. The special schools don't do anything special, they just cut down the distractions, shift 0.5-2 university years into the school and spice things up with some competitive math/physics/programming/chemistry/biology/geography/etc.

I don't believe there is anything as too stupid child. Not even a stupid child. They become stupid adults, often because of school and people there treating them as stupid children when in fact it's a problem with the socioeconomical/family situation.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#255

Post by disiplus »

pandaman wrote: post #238
Endlessly wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read, then reread, and still do not understand your point. Are you saying that in Russia, since the education was free that the goal of the textbooks was to make it hard to want to stay in school, if so, to me, seems like it’s unlikely, but possible. Putting aside non-Russian textbooks, what are you saying the intended reasoning of the textbook form was as it relates to Russian culture?

I don't think the books were made hard intentionally. From what I understand, in the US, the same course on, say, Introduction to Calculus, can be attended by people who are learning to be MDs, chemical engineers, accountants and mathematicians because there is no fixed curriculum and everyone can pick up that course. So the textbooks and courses need to be as accessible as possible to accommodate a wide range of apt…

it's/was the same in ex yugoslavia countries.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#256

Post by jerzyt »

yters wrote: post #132
jerzyt wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia had brilliant mathematicians even before the October revolution, however, the Soviet Union gave another incentive to become an academic - it pretty much guaranteed a highly respected job, even if the salary was modest, but also allowed most of the academics to not get involved in politics. So in a country where you couldn't form a business, being an academic or a doctor was pretty much the best career choice.

At least the engineers were too useful to the state to get purged frequently.

Although there were exceptions. If you got hitched to a high-visibility program, failure was considered a sabotage.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#257

Post by TeMPOraL »

visarga wrote: post #219
madhadron wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having worked from translations and occasionally originals of some of the Russian texts, they're actually utterly marvelous.

Same situation in Romania, some of the best math problem books I found were a bunch of books printed before 1980's. The problems were just wonderful. I was desperately searching for them for my kids through my father's library. In 1990's after the revolution we got humanitarian aid from Western Europe, including some French math textbooks. They were so low level (simple) I was in disbelief. Useless.

I had the same reaction in Poland, when my grandfather gave me some textbooks from his collection. They were an order of magnitude better than what I was using at school.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#258

Post by tonyedgecombe »

runeks wrote: post #236
julianeon wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like it's worth pointing out here, for Americans who don't know better (no blame implied), that the French have one of the best mathematical pipelines in the world. They have almost as many Nobels (13 vs. 11) despite having 1/5 the population. Guardian article about them here: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/may/31/europa-french-... So please don't think France is a backwater that just doesn't know how…

> I feel like it's worth pointing out here, for Americans who don't know better (no blame implied), that the French have one of the best mathematical pipelines in the world. They have almost as many Nobels (13 vs. 11) despite having 1/5 the population. I’d much rather measure an educational system by how much it teaches the average person, than by how many Nobel prize winners it produces.

The two might not be exclusive. Perhaps one of the side effects of the masses having a good grip on trigonometry is producing more Nobel laureates.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#259

Post by madaxe_again »

sershe wrote: post #125
Endlessly wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious, what do you and your peers that were feed into a well defined path so early make of it now understanding that is not how all children reach advanced skills in mathematics?

In iirc 8th grade, I've placed high in the final round of a Moscow-wide physics competition, incidentally hosted by MSU. My classmate, who placed even higher, and myself have received an invitation to enroll in the MSU-affiliated maths/physics focused school (#2, the schools in Moscow are all numbered semi arbitrarily). As far as I recall, every time I'd go to one of those competitions bulk of the people in later rou…

> and I didn't go because was too lazy to commute 40mins one way when my own school was a 3-minute walk

Hah, that mirrors my wife’s experience in Riga - she came second and first in national physics competitions for two years, and was twice invited to enroll in a different school - but she stayed put, because she didn’t want to have to change trams twice, rather than a direct trolley bus. She’s happy with her choice.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#260

Post by Arnt »

alanh wrote: post #239
arduanika wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And indeed 57 looks a bit prime for some psychological reason It tricked me, until I read the link.

No one taught me this in school, but if you add up the digits (5+7=12) and the result is divisible by 3, then so is the original number. It works recursively.

My maths teacher made me prove that, my first proof by induction. Try it. You know you want to procrastinate with a nice proof by induction now.
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