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Foundations of Computer Science

i.stanford.edu

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Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#71

Post by Retric »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #69
TeMPOraL wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the mathematics is basically distilled, formalized art of precise thinking. It's the art of manipulating and morphing mental models. It's as much about numbers as astronomy is about telescopes ;).

Forming a model might not involve precise thinking, it often involves lateral thinking, at least with me. I heard that computer science was more of a subset of music than math.

Higher math requires a great deal of lateral thinking. Also, music an math are often closely related but I don't see the connection between music an say computer vision.

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#72

Post by Retric »

RockyMcNuts wrote: post #67
chengiz wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok I'll bite. Why is "creating the right model for thinking about a problem and devising the appropriate mechanizable techniques to solve it" a subset of mathematics ?

Computer science is the study of algorithms, information systems and anything that is computable. Mathematics is the study of formal systems, eg proofs that can be derived from axioms using algorithms, i.e. a specific type of computable system. Therefore, mathematics is a subset of computer science.

Math includes the study of non computable things. Also, Math includes chaos theory which is more than just a formal system.

EX: computable numbers are a subset of all numbers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computable_number

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#73

Post by peter303 »

I was in the Stanford bookstore a few days ago and noticed their summer softback text for their summer Comp Sci 101 course was $132. It was about Java and basic computer principles together. It resembled a standard softback beginning Java reference book but with some exercises added to each chapter. Aho and Jeff have done a fine service offering their more meaty textook online gratis. (You dont even want to know what hardback texts cost- over $200.)

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#74

Post by peter303 »

Computer Science has come of age when textbooks from 20 years ago are about as relevant as they are today. That means there are now timeless principles in the discipline. Most of the computer languages used in mY MIT classes 40 years ago are not around today.

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#75

Post by nsomaru »

From the preface (prerequisites):

> Students taking courses based on this book have ranged from first-year undergraduates to graduate students. We assume only that students have had a solid course in programming. They should be familiar with the programming language ANSI C to use this edition. In particular, we expect students to be comfortable with C constructs such as recursive functions, structures, pointers, and operators involving pointers and structures such as dot, ->, and &.\

Could someone recommend a resource for someone who is fairly proficient in Python?

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#76

Post by Loadin »

nsomaru wrote: post #75

From the preface (prerequisites): > Students taking courses based on this book have ranged from first-year undergraduates to graduate students. We assume only that students have had a solid course in programming. They should be familiar with the programming language ANSI C to use this edition. In particular, we expect students to be comfortable with C constructs such as recursive functions, structures, pointers, and…

The C Programming Language =]

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#77

Post by seanmcdirmid »

Retric wrote: post #71
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forming a model might not involve precise thinking, it often involves lateral thinking, at least with me. I heard that computer science was more of a subset of music than math.

Higher math requires a great deal of lateral thinking. Also, music an math are often closely related but I don't see the connection between music an say computer vision.

Computer vision practitioners do mostly math, are we calling them computer scientists also? Sheesh :). Whenever I get in the same room with one, we are talking completely different languages (and we do have a sizeable computer vision team in our lab).

Re: Foundations of Computer Science

#79

Post by loupeabody »

Many many many thanks for this link. That's another resource in the bucket along with SICP[0] and MIT 6.00[1]. I'm gonna have a beastly year for learning.

[0]http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book-Z-H-4.html [1]http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-comput...

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