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Follow that up with his slightly more advanced The Art of Insight in Science and Engineering [0]. I feel like these two books plus Art Benjamin's Secrets of Me

by sn9 11y ago

Follow that up with his slightly more advanced The Art of Insight in Science and Engineering [0]. I feel like these two books plus Art Benjamin's Secrets of Mental Math [1] would put your Fermi calculation abilities on another level. [0] https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/art-insight-science-and-engineering https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/art-insight-science-and-engin...

JadeNB 11y ago
Without meaning to slight those who have the latter ability, I think that building your problem-solving muscles, as I believe that this book tries to encourage, is far more important than building your mental-math muscles. (I say this as someone who takes pride in my own very limited capacity for mental math.) While these muscles are not totally unrelated, it is possible to be good at either skill and poor at the other; and, to the extent that it is necessary to choose, I had much rather live in a society of people who can solve problems well but ponderously slowly than one of people who can find lightning-fast answers, but only when others have already asked the right questions.
- thekingofspain 11y ago
  Apologies in advance for not adding anything to the discussion, but I believe you mean "I would much rather", because "I'd much rather" != "I had much rather".
  - Fezzik 11y ago
    It can mean I had, I would, or I should, depending on context: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/i'd http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/i'd
    - taneq 11y ago
      Wow, that's crazy and ambiguous. I've never heard of "I'd" as a contraction for "I should", how do you tell whether to expand it as that or "I would"?
      - startling 11y ago
        Context.
      - ktRolster 11y ago
        I think it's archaic, "I should think so"
  - JadeNB 11y ago
    "[H]ad much rather" is a bit archaic, but perfectly cromulent: http://www.google.com/search?q=%22had+much+rather%22 http://www.google.com/search?q=%22had+much+rather%22 .
- lomnakkus 11y ago
  > I think that building your problem-solving muscles, as I believe that this book tries to encourage, is far more important than building your mental-math muscles. (I say this as someone who takes pride in my own very limited capacity for mental math.) While these muscles are not totally unrelated, it is possible to be good at either skill and poor at the other I can only agree, but I may be biased because I'm a lot better at the problem-solving than the mental-math :). I'm always impressed by the mental agility of people like Art Benjamin, but I'm not convinced it's quite as valuable when it comes to it... given that computers can outperform him by orders of magnitude. Btw, both of Mahajan's books are great, but if were to say which was more valuable to the general public I'd say it was Streeth-fighting. In my educational efforts, I've always been astounded at how bad people are at minimally sanity-checking their results when doing math problems. Even order-of-magnitude sanity checks seemed to beyond most of my students. In physics[1] you at least have units to sanity check against, but you'd be surprised how few students actually understand even unit-math enough to be able to check that they weren't comparing an acceleration value (m/s^2) to speed (m/s). (Assuming SI units. You can do this completely generally by having abstract units "dimension" and "time", "mass", etc.) [1] If there's one complaint I have against Math education it's that all my educators actively encouraged eliding the units even for problems based on physics. I'm not sure if this was just to try to trip students up on tests, but it was absolutely horrible from an educational perspective. ALWAYS keep the goddamn units so you can at least minimally sanity check your result!
  - ollyfg 11y ago
    If there is one thing I've learned from university, it's this. Keeping units makes your writing messier and longer, but when it comes to checking they are absolutely invaluable. Your equation to give you volumetric flow gave you (kg/s)? Well density is (kg/m^3) so just divide your answer by density! (this is a problem my friend was having just yesterday)
    - samatman 11y ago
      To automate this process, check out Frink[0], which takes unit calculations to the obsessive limit. [0] https://futureboy.us/frinkdocs/ https://futureboy.us/frinkdocs/
- sn9 11y ago
  I agree whole-heartedly.
ashwinl 11y ago
For those who haven't picked up Art of Insight in Science and Engineering, table of contents here: https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/titles/free_download/9780262526548_Art_of_Insight.pdf https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/titles/free_dow... "This book shows you how to build insight and understanding first, so that you do not drown in complexity. Therefore, our approach will not be rigorous -- for rigor easily becomes rigor mortis or paralysis by analysis"
- marvy 11y ago
  That's not the table of contents, that's the whole book.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - arama471 11y ago
    Its CC "The Art of Insight in Science and Engineering: Mastering Complexity by Sanjoy Mahajan (author) and MIT Press (publisher) is licensed under the Creative Commons At- tribution–Noncommercial–ShareAlike 4.0 International License" I'm sure including the whole book is easier
    - marvy 11y ago
      No doubt it's easier, but it's worth mentioning :)
kriro 11y ago
I have missed both the linked book (2010) and "The Art of Insight in Science and Engineering" (2014). Both sound like the exact kind of books I'd love and devour. I guess one month+ of fun reading/doing is ahead of me :)

by sn9 11y ago

JadeNB 11y ago

Without meaning to slight those who have the latter ability, I think that building your problem-solving muscles, as I believe that this book tries to encourage, is far more important than building your mental-math muscles. (I say this as someone who takes pride in my own very limited capacity for mental math.) While these muscles are not totally unrelated, it is possible to be good at either skill and poor at the other; and, to the extent that it is necessary to choose, I had much rather live in a society of people who can solve problems well but ponderously slowly than one of people who can find lightning-fast answers, but only when others have already asked the right questions.

thekingofspain 11y ago
Apologies in advance for not adding anything to the discussion, but I believe you mean "I would much rather", because "I'd much rather" != "I had much rather".
- Fezzik 11y ago
  It can mean I had, I would, or I should, depending on context: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/i'd http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/i'd
  - taneq 11y ago
    Wow, that's crazy and ambiguous. I've never heard of "I'd" as a contraction for "I should", how do you tell whether to expand it as that or "I would"?
    - startling 11y ago
      Context.
    - ktRolster 11y ago
      I think it's archaic, "I should think so"
- JadeNB 11y ago
  "[H]ad much rather" is a bit archaic, but perfectly cromulent: http://www.google.com/search?q=%22had+much+rather%22 http://www.google.com/search?q=%22had+much+rather%22 .
lomnakkus 11y ago
> I think that building your problem-solving muscles, as I believe that this book tries to encourage, is far more important than building your mental-math muscles. (I say this as someone who takes pride in my own very limited capacity for mental math.) While these muscles are not totally unrelated, it is possible to be good at either skill and poor at the other I can only agree, but I may be biased because I'm a lot better at the problem-solving than the mental-math :). I'm always impressed by the mental agility of people like Art Benjamin, but I'm not convinced it's quite as valuable when it comes to it... given that computers can outperform him by orders of magnitude. Btw, both of Mahajan's books are great, but if were to say which was more valuable to the general public I'd say it was Streeth-fighting. In my educational efforts, I've always been astounded at how bad people are at minimally sanity-checking their results when doing math problems. Even order-of-magnitude sanity checks seemed to beyond most of my students. In physics[1] you at least have units to sanity check against, but you'd be surprised how few students actually understand even unit-math enough to be able to check that they weren't comparing an acceleration value (m/s^2) to speed (m/s). (Assuming SI units. You can do this completely generally by having abstract units "dimension" and "time", "mass", etc.) [1] If there's one complaint I have against Math education it's that all my educators actively encouraged eliding the units even for problems based on physics. I'm not sure if this was just to try to trip students up on tests, but it was absolutely horrible from an educational perspective. ALWAYS keep the goddamn units so you can at least minimally sanity check your result!
- ollyfg 11y ago
  If there is one thing I've learned from university, it's this. Keeping units makes your writing messier and longer, but when it comes to checking they are absolutely invaluable. Your equation to give you volumetric flow gave you (kg/s)? Well density is (kg/m^3) so just divide your answer by density! (this is a problem my friend was having just yesterday)
  - samatman 11y ago
    To automate this process, check out Frink[0], which takes unit calculations to the obsessive limit. [0] https://futureboy.us/frinkdocs/ https://futureboy.us/frinkdocs/
sn9 11y ago
I agree whole-heartedly.

ashwinl 11y ago

For those who haven't picked up Art of Insight in Science and Engineering, table of contents here: https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/titles/free_download/9780262526548_Art_of_Insight.pdf https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/titles/free_dow... "This book shows you how to build insight and understanding first, so that you do not drown in complexity. Therefore, our approach will not be rigorous -- for rigor easily becomes rigor mortis or paralysis by analysis"

marvy 11y ago
That's not the table of contents, that's the whole book.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- arama471 11y ago
  Its CC "The Art of Insight in Science and Engineering: Mastering Complexity by Sanjoy Mahajan (author) and MIT Press (publisher) is licensed under the Creative Commons At- tribution–Noncommercial–ShareAlike 4.0 International License" I'm sure including the whole book is easier
  - marvy 11y ago
    No doubt it's easier, but it's worth mentioning :)

kriro 11y ago

I have missed both the linked book (2010) and "The Art of Insight in Science and Engineering" (2014). Both sound like the exact kind of books I'd love and devour. I guess one month+ of fun reading/doing is ahead of me :)