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Guy's Math & Astro Blog

Guy's Math & Astro Blog

Monthly Archives: May 2018

Why Math?

25 Friday May 2018

Posted by gfbrandenburg in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

… sharing this from a discussion on learning math on Quora. I agree with the writer on most of it:

=========================

Saleem Rana
Answered Jul 4, 2017

I don’t think it’s actually a question of IQ. Anyone of average intelligence can understand mathematics provided that they learn in a sequential way and they follow a well-developed curriculum. I like to believe that mathematics is logical enough so that even the most difficult concepts can be grasped if it is explained by a patient teacher.

I’d like to posit a different question: why do people of average intelligence dislike (perhaps hate, fear, and despise) mathematics?

Here are 7 possible reasons:

  1. They had horrible teachers when they were little who humiliated them. Mathematics was weaponized by bitter people to bludgeon their student’s budding sense of identity.
  2. They missed learning essential skills in early grades which made it difficult to understand slightly more advanced mathematical steps at a higher grade level.
  3. They never got to a point where they saw the aesthetic nature of math and that nature itself appears to be entirely based on mathematical principles. (Once someone gets to this point, mathematics is as delightful as drawing, painting, or sculpting.)
  4. They resorted to memorizing formulas without understanding the underlying order of any mathematical idea.
  5. They were forced to do mathematics to pass an examination rather than introduced to it as a conceptual tool (probably the best one humans have ever invented or discovered.)
  6. They never wondered if humankind invented mathematics or if mathematics is actually the fabric of reality that astute human beings have observed and reflected on.
  7. They never marveled at the raw genius of someone like Srinivasa Ramanujan or how Issac Newton and and Gottfried Leibniz independently invented calculus during the mid 17th century. The beauty of these romantic stories about mathematics completely escapes them.

Prasad’s Home-Grown Drive Controller

19 Saturday May 2018

Posted by gfbrandenburg in Uncategorized

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Prasad D made a great mirror in our telescope-making workshop here at the Chevy Chase Community Center, and then proceeded to machine a wonderful Crayford focuser, from scratch, after I showed him how to use our 1944-era South Bend lathe. A very friendly fellow, he unfortunately (for us) moved to Philadelphia, which is not really close, but he’s kept up doing excellent ATM work.

As an example, on Tuesday last he brought in a brand new German equatorial drive and controller system that he had cobbled together from various parts. He replaced the original motors in the drive head with stepper motors, and then put together an Arduino board, a wireless communicator, and two stepper-motor controllers. All of the circuit is controlled from an app that he devised, on his Android device. We didn’t have any clear skies to try it out, but I could certainly see the motors slewing to various invisible objects such as the star Procyon and Messier Object 42..

Really first-rate job, and very nicely done! (He said he didn’t want it to look half-baked, and it doesn’t!)

Prasad asked me to “please give credit to the original creator of the electronics – Howard Dutton. He calls the system OnStep. It is based on Arduino Teensy3.2 microcomputer and it can be customized for any type of mount including Dobsonian. It is very easy to work with and your students at CCCC may find it interesting.”
I see a web page with lots of information: http://www.stellarjourney.com/index.php?r=site/equipment_onstep

I’ll post some still photos here and then upload two short videos to Youtube – which I cannot embed on this blog, but can only link to. If you click on the photos, you can see larger images.

 

IMG_0522
IMG_0521 (1)
IMG_0525 (1)
IMG_0523 (1)

 

Here is the first video that I took of his device in operation: https://youtu.be/Md06jD35CUg

Here is the link to a shorter video, not as detailed, that I took of the device:  https://youtu.be/bH_i58LhtiY

If you have problems viewing any of this, please let me know by leaving a comment. Thanks.

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