"most readers want to know is why they are important". This happened to me in my second year studying physics and applied math. The math teacher did not know h

"most readers want to know is why they are important". This happened to me in my second year studying physics and applied math. The math teacher did not know how to explain the importance of the math around the eigenvalues etc. Only a year later when taking quantum mechanics we got to the applications of that math. However in hindsight I hope he was trolling me :-) otherwise we need a separate curriculum for math teachers to get in touch with the reality :-)