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Despite the fun title and the apparent sense that somehow the material is digestible by a kindergartener, this paper is really only accessible and relevant if y

Despite the fun title and the apparent sense that somehow the material is digestible by a kindergartener, this paper is really only accessible and relevant if you’re already well versed in the language of quantum computation and you’re interested in different ways to construct, represent, and manipulate quantum circuits using a mathematical formalism called the ZX calculus.

sandworm101 6y ago
As I read through it I was asking myself whether the author had ever met many kindergarteners. Just saying that something is "like a lego block" doesn't make it so. At best, the lego block can be used to illustrate a concept just as ping-pong balls might be used to diagram DNA. That doesn't mean that anyone who can play pingpong understands genetic drift.
mncharity 6y ago
> somehow the material is digestible by a kindergartener, this paper is really only accessible and relevant if When suggesting a novel science education conceptualization, there are two sides. Science side, showing correctness and fruitfulness. These research papers. And education side, showing accessibility and effectiveness. The long unavailable book. Though I fuzzily recall fragments or draft being available somewhere. Say I were exploring how getting the color of the Sun right in K-13, might then be used to help teach other things better, like color. Which I just might get around to. And maybe, beyond a correctly colored circle, I wanted realistic limb darkening and tint. Science side would be python color code, and spectra from papers. Or perhaps now simply python exoplanet library code. Education side is a white circle. Maybe a radial gradient for easily drawing it with a slightly darkened and red tinted edge. And perhaps a "no, not yellow, not at all - that's a pervasively common misconception - sorry all the adults and textbooks in your life are wrong - collectively we suck and don't care". :/ One side is color theory and code, browser limitations and image standards. On the other, a white circle. In the pipeline from science research to education content, I suggest the bottleneck failure is at the science end. In using deep domain understanding to explore for fruitful and accessible conceptualizations. Whether string diagrams for quantum works out as educational content seems an open question. But it seems to me a good question. This work has context in speculation that string diagrams might provide a useful representation across a variety of domains. With its ties to category theory. One nice aspect of string diagrams is that transformation correctness is more transparent than with equations. And one can easily imagine interactive editors making it a plaything. Scratch 2040, but vastly more general and powerful. But fleshing out how it might be used to represent various domains is IIRC a work in progress. As is demonstrating that it's a compelling cross-domain representation. Then there will be minor matters of pedagogy, and finding a foothold ahead of large scale curriculum change. But first task is finding something usefully worth attempting to teach.

sandworm101 6y ago

As I read through it I was asking myself whether the author had ever met many kindergarteners. Just saying that something is "like a lego block" doesn't make it so. At best, the lego block can be used to illustrate a concept just as ping-pong balls might be used to diagram DNA. That doesn't mean that anyone who can play pingpong understands genetic drift.

mncharity 6y ago

> somehow the material is digestible by a kindergartener, this paper is really only accessible and relevant if When suggesting a novel science education conceptualization, there are two sides. Science side, showing correctness and fruitfulness. These research papers. And education side, showing accessibility and effectiveness. The long unavailable book. Though I fuzzily recall fragments or draft being available somewhere. Say I were exploring how getting the color of the Sun right in K-13, might then be used to help teach other things better, like color. Which I just might get around to. And maybe, beyond a correctly colored circle, I wanted realistic limb darkening and tint. Science side would be python color code, and spectra from papers. Or perhaps now simply python exoplanet library code. Education side is a white circle. Maybe a radial gradient for easily drawing it with a slightly darkened and red tinted edge. And perhaps a "no, not yellow, not at all - that's a pervasively common misconception - sorry all the adults and textbooks in your life are wrong - collectively we suck and don't care". :/ One side is color theory and code, browser limitations and image standards. On the other, a white circle. In the pipeline from science research to education content, I suggest the bottleneck failure is at the science end. In using deep domain understanding to explore for fruitful and accessible conceptualizations. Whether string diagrams for quantum works out as educational content seems an open question. But it seems to me a good question. This work has context in speculation that string diagrams might provide a useful representation across a variety of domains. With its ties to category theory. One nice aspect of string diagrams is that transformation correctness is more transparent than with equations. And one can easily imagine interactive editors making it a plaything. Scratch 2040, but vastly more general and powerful. But fleshing out how it might be used to represent various domains is IIRC a work in progress. As is demonstrating that it's a compelling cross-domain representation. Then there will be minor matters of pedagogy, and finding a foothold ahead of large scale curriculum change. But first task is finding something usefully worth attempting to teach.