kalid

10 ms·

1. 121.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   I haven't done much physics, but Feynman is my teaching inspiration. He has his famous lectures on Physics: http://www.feynmanlectures.caltech.edu (Put online by Michael Hartl, of TauDay fame among others.) I haven't g
2. 122.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Exactly! There's a quote from a famous mathematician at the time that the negatives "Darken the very whole doctrines of the equations". If positive is good, negative must be evil right? And how can "less than nothing&quo
3. 123.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Thanks for the feedback! The book is more of a "top concepts I wish I knew" but not really a ground-up tutorial. For starting from a clean slate, you might like: http://betterexplained.com/static/articles&#x2F
4. 124.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Just saw your earlier comment, thank you! 1) Yep, the regular percentage formula is pretty basic. Mostly, I like it because we've overlooked something that's been under our noses for years or decades. What else have we been missin
5. 125.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Hey nick! Thanks for kind words, it's really touching to know when things are clicking. I'd love to see how things go with people that aren't math experts. My philosophy is I found one math up the mountain, it worked for me,
6. 126.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Great point. I find myself looking at the history of the idea when writing up a post. Did you realize negative numbers were only accepted in the late 1700s? That the Fourier Transform was originally rejected as untrue when first presented,
7. 127.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Beautiful way to put it! We aren't always explicit about the subject of the transformation. Similarly, when working with exponents, I think: e^ix is really 1 * e^ix That is, we're starting with 1.0 and doing a transformation (rota
8. 128.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   I've been considering a patreon page, but the best way is to help share the site with people learning math (students, family friends, etc.). A genuine recommendation is one of the best things I can ask for. Thank you!
9. 129.▲
   by kalid 11y ago

   Update, I've made a static version of the site ( http://betterexplained.com/static/ ) which you can browse. I'm redirecting requests there.
10. 130.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks! Working on getting a fully static version of the site up. Argh, Wordpress with even caching plugins, still folds. (It's on reddit and getting 100x normal traffic). Eventually a postmortem will be in order. Static links to some
11. 131.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Awesome! (Kalid from BetterExplained here.) This goes for everyone, all the articles are under a CC license.
12. 132.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    I think I left a palm-print on my forehead when I saw that.
13. 133.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks! I was really hesitant to force an acronym (it actually started as ADE) but then I realized I could work my way up to the full technical definition. Really glad to hear it's resonating. (Sometimes things happen out of order, i.e
14. 134.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Hey, Kalid from BetterExplained here, thanks! My general philosophy is to be really, really honest with myself if I understood something. It's ok (really!) to admit when we haven't fully understood a concept. Want a fun example? H
15. 135.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks. It's great exploring these "What if?" questions with kids (or adults). Math becomes more like a world to explore than something we're supposed to "learn".
16. 136.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks Ken, same here when starting school :).
17. 137.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    That's awesome to hear, thanks. I realize learning is more than knowledge transfer, you have to keep up the momentum to learn (for me, the joy of an intuition keeps me cranking away at tough topics).
18. 138.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    (Kalid from BetterExplained here) Thanks, really glad the site is resonating. My goal is to ask the genuine (and slightly uncomfortable) question of "Did I experience the concept beyond the technical definition?" For something lik
19. 139.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    I keep an ideas.txt on my computer (synced to my phone in Dropbox). When you're out and something strikes you (something frustrating? interesting? could be made better?) just jot it down. Capture it in the moment, don't wait until
20. 140.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks for the reply. I struggled with the title a bit, in my head I think of the "XYZ Fallacy" as a trap we are likely fall into. For me, the trap was overemphasizing a set of implicit rules and trying to explicitly teach those r
21. 141.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Exactly. Terry Tao calls this having a "post-rigorous" understanding ( https://terrytao.wordpress.com/career-advice/there’s-more-to... ). We can't think the formal rules are sufficient. (And in the case of
22. 142.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks!
23. 143.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    Thanks for the feedback! Glad you've enjoyed the articles thus far :). The adjective order rules are interesting in that we have to reverse-engineer them from our brains, but aren't consciously aware of them. It's apparently
24. 144.▲
    by kalid 11y ago

    (Kalid from betterexplained here) Thanks for the comment, totally agree with moderation. My goal is to ask "Is the structure I'm providing helpful right now?". There's an implicit assumption that "more structure is
25. 145.▲
    by kalid 12y ago

    Well said. Where's the video version of Wikipedia? Hacker news/reddit? As a teaching tool, video doesn't lend itself to iterative refinement or discussion. It's an excellent audiovisual experience, but also a bet that th
26. 146.▲
    by kalid 12y ago

    For Prof. Larry Peterson's networking class, we had to build up a web server over the course of a semester. You built IP, and used that library to build TCP, and then served files over your TCP connection. It was the first time I reali
27. 147.▲
    by kalid 12y ago

    My take: The eigenvectors are the “axes” of the transformation represented by the matrix. Consider spinning a globe (the universe of vectors): every location faces a new direction, except the poles. An “eigenvector” is an input that doesn’t
28. 148.▲
    by kalid 12y ago

    I've always been a fan of Einstein's quote "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." Writing about a topic is a good test of whether you can explain it simply.
29. 149.▲
    by kalid 12y ago

    Hey Ivan! Been meaning to reach out about your mini reference guides, I really like the approach. I agree on aligning with common core, I've been out of school so long I forget what old textbooks are like (the courses I have are more l
30. 150.▲
    by kalid 12y ago

    Awesome, glad to hear!