Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015) • Hacker News Board

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#111

Post by misnome » Tue, Apr 23, 2019, 10:56 PM UTC

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #31

Hands-down, the best presentation and note-taking math class I recall in college (discrete mathematics, a graph theory course, heavy on drawings) was run through a Wacom pen display on the lectern, linked to a projector. The professor could accurately and cleanly draw the required notation with his hand flat. Why erase when space is infinite, just scroll and/or zoom in the desired direction. A full color spectrum was…

We had a lecturer who tried this with an early tablet computer (c2005) and IIRC, onenote. He got about two or three lines of equations on the screen at once before scrolling it off the top, so there was none of the ability to slow down, comprehend, then quick transcription that moving onto multiple blackboards allowed.

Having the last 10 minutes of progress, or more in special lecture theatres - allowed cross-referencing and observation that is hard to replicate with pre-prepared slides or with a single window of view.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#112

Post by privong » Tue, Apr 23, 2019, 11:08 PM UTC

This reminds me some of what I've read about Blackwing pencils (originally made by Eberhard Faber Company), which were discontinued in 1998. The originals (NOS) were apparently quite sought after once production ceased. California Cedar Products is now making a "Blackwing" pencil[0] which purports to be the "revival", but there is some criticism[e.g., 1].

I have never used an original Blackwing, so I cannot comment on those, but the new ones are enjoyable to write with. It's similar to the feeling I have when using fountain pens – they're such an improvement for the act of writing that I actively seek out reasons to hand-write things.

The specifics of this chalk story versus the Blackwing story are different, but it's neat to see the passion people have for their writing implements. And that many of these, admittedly higher-quality, versions seem to be unable to survive the decrease in hand-written forms.

As for me, I do prefer chalk to whiteboards. I've always been slightly annoyed at getting chalk on my hands and so think I would have enjoyed using this chalk if I'd had the opportunity. But I see fewer and fewer chalkboards around.

[0] https://blackwing602.com/

[1] https://blackwingpages.com/facts-fiction-and-the-blackwing-e...

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#113

Post by adestefan » Tue, Apr 23, 2019, 11:28 PM UTC

CyanBird wrote: post #58

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #31

Hands-down, the best presentation and note-taking math class I recall in college (discrete mathematics, a graph theory course, heavy on drawings) was run through a Wacom pen display on the lectern, linked to a projector. The professor could accurately and cleanly draw the required notation with his hand flat. Why erase when space is infinite, just scroll and/or zoom in the desired direction. A full color spectrum was…

Oh god that sounds just so incredibly good

My graduate stats teacher used a system like this and it was horrible. His handwriting was so bad on the tablet, but much better on the chalkboard.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#114

Post by magicalhippo » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 12:00 AM UTC

gowld wrote: post #101

magicalhippo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found the exact opposite when learning math. I need to write it down, and when presented with Power Point I have to transform it into something I can understand, and that means I don't have enough attention left to really listen to the lecturer. On the other hand, the lecturers that used a blackboard at my uni all had prepared the lecture, what they wrote was meant to be written in a notebook. They wrote it at a pa…

Shouldn't you be paying full attention instead of taking redundant dictation during lecture? If you weren't stuck with following a chalkboard, typos could be fixed once and for all time at the source, instead of reappearing at random in every lecture.

But that's the point, I was paying full attention. By writing things down, I had time to process and think about what I wrote. I had time to fully follow the derivations. And that's in addition to the reinforcement effect that the act of writing has (at least for me).

Merely sitting there passively listening would not be paying full attention.

Of course, this required the lecturers to write in a suitable tempo.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#115

Post by raziel2701 » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 1:30 AM UTC

gowld wrote: post #97

thanatropism wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mathematicians like to believe that we're smarter than average, but we're actually just very focused. Serious question: does this spell doom for people with ADHD?

In my experience, yes, unless treated with amphetamines.

You might be onto something here. Paul Erdos used to consume amphetamines and he was a prolific mathematician.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#116

Post by ubercow13 » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 2:34 AM UTC

gowld wrote: post #101

magicalhippo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found the exact opposite when learning math. I need to write it down, and when presented with Power Point I have to transform it into something I can understand, and that means I don't have enough attention left to really listen to the lecturer. On the other hand, the lecturers that used a blackboard at my uni all had prepared the lecture, what they wrote was meant to be written in a notebook. They wrote it at a pa…

Shouldn't you be paying full attention instead of taking redundant dictation during lecture? If you weren't stuck with following a chalkboard, typos could be fixed once and for all time at the source, instead of reappearing at random in every lecture.

In a way writing is part of thinking with mathematics. Try solving a long complex homework problem without writing anything.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#117

Post by trentmb » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 5:06 AM UTC

thanatropism wrote: post #96

Syzygies wrote: post #42

My Hagoromo chalk and eraser notes: https://www.math.columbia.edu/~bayer/LinearAlgebra/Video/Cha... CNN is doing a short web video on this chalk, and I was interviewed last week. They particularly liked my custom attache case for carrying all my colors to teach. When I drew diagrams revealing Catalan number correspondences, they were quite worried that these pictures "weren't math" and I might be hoodwinking them. Th…

> Mathematicians like to believe that we're smarter than average, but we're actually just very focused. Serious question: does this spell doom for people with ADHD?

> Serious question: does this spell doom for people with ADHD?

Caveat: undergrad in math, working on a part time coursework masters (I'm hoping to talk someone into being my advisor for a part time thesis)

No more so than any other academic subject.

If anything, I've found math more friendly to my ADHD than philosophy, literature, etc.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#118

Post by Bartweiss » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 4:12 PM UTC

thanatropism wrote: post #95

Bartweiss wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Working a project on a blackboard also encourages people to get the order right . It's surprisingly common to see Powerpoints which skip or reorder steps completely because the slide creator shuffled things around or worked backwards from the answer. I'm sure most people have seen professors skip numerous steps on blackboards, too, but in my experience there's at least a heightened awareness of what it looks like to…

What's best about black/whiteboards for me is precisely the nonlinearity. Numerous times I've seen professors realize near step 10 of the proof that something they said in step 3 isn't quite right; then a sidebar is opened and arrows start to be drawn to piece the puzzle together. The point of going to classes versus studying alone at home is that you get to watch mathematicians doing mathematics. It's apprenticeship…

This is a much better expression of what's great about chalkboards than just the order of steps, thank you. It's not so much seeing a problem worked out in sequence as seeing it worked out for real. Even if the professor is working from lecture notes with all the steps, writing them out live engages with the content in a way that pressing "next bullet" doesn't. And as you said, what's missing is the messiness - catching mistakes in the notes, making mistakes on the board and finding them, puzzling over what belonged at a missing step.

Everyone jokes about the frustration of copying a full blackboard worth of notes and then having the professor go "wait no, that wasn't right" (myself included) but it's a valuable experience. That moment of "hm, hold on a second" is where the math is happening, and a chalkboard helps professors and students notice that. (And of course, when something "isn't quite right" on the Powerpoint, it's a tremendous pain to fix...)

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#119

Post by moftz » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 4:47 PM UTC

max76 wrote: post #88

moftz wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the professor just recorded the lecture, I'd imagine most students would never go to class again.

If no one goes to the physical classroom why not sell the same recorded lecture to a thousand people online instead of the 100 that fit into a classroom?

I had a world history/geography/current events kind of class in college that had an in-person lecture and was also livestreamed and recorded. Lecture hall fit about 1800 people but he also had an unlimited class size "online" section you could sign up for if you didn't get in-person section during early course request. You never actually had to go to class. The professor had to get his own system for taking quizes and handing in assignments since the online learning management system the school used would choke with that many students at once trying to submit things.

Content aside, it was a very interestingly run course. Assignments were at your own pace, you had a large list of the kinds of projects you could turn in for credit. There were quizzes, exams, essay topics, interview topics, and an option for independent projects to get credit. Each kind of project had it's own maximum point value it would be graded out of and the final grade was totally based on how many points your actually earned, not out of how many. Even if you did a shit job on every assignment, as long as you did enough of them, you could get an A. It was a nice way to boost the GPA from just sheer effort rather than actual achievement.

Re: Mathematicians are hoarding a type of Japanese chalk (2015)

#120

Post by thanatropism » Wed, Apr 24, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

trentmb wrote: post #117

thanatropism wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mathematicians like to believe that we're smarter than average, but we're actually just very focused. Serious question: does this spell doom for people with ADHD?

> Serious question: does this spell doom for people with ADHD? Caveat: undergrad in math, working on a part time coursework masters (I'm hoping to talk someone into being my advisor for a part time thesis) No more so than any other academic subject. If anything, I've found math more friendly to my ADHD than philosophy, literature, etc.

I successfully completed an Applied Math masters and defended a dissertation on symplectic integration. But that didn’t quite give me the superpowers my professors had.