Why all the science hate?

[mr friendly guy]

Completing the square is a basic algebra operation. They covered it in my high school long before covering the quadratic formula. You were expected to understand how to complete the square as a wholly separate milestone, before being taught how to derive and then use the quadratic formula. Either math standards really do vary quite massively from region to region or the worst of the rumours I've heard about declining math standards in the current generation are true.

I did learn it in high school before learning the quadratic formula. But its been ages since I had to do it. However after looking at your hints, well as the Celine Dion song goes "Its all coming back to me".

[defanatic]

Completing the square is a basic algebra operation. They covered it in my high school long before covering the quadratic formula. You were expected to understand how to complete the square as a wholly separate milestone, before being taught how to derive and then use the quadratic formula. Either math standards really do vary quite massively from region to region or the worst of the rumours I've heard about declining math standards in the current generation are true.

Math standards are quite differant, and are slipping worldwide apprently. Definetly in Israel.

We learn completing the square ages before quadratic formula (there were other things in between, but I couldn't tell you specifically). The quadratic formula we learned in year ten. I think I learned completing the square in year 7.

[Darth Wong]

Taking Mr. Wong's hint as a challenge to do the problem without the standard technique of completing the square, take an equation in the form ax²+bx+c=0. Then, assuming two solutions, y and z, we should have (1) y+z = -b/a and (2) yz = c/a [1], so that y²-2yz+z² = b²/a² - 4c/a = (b²-4ac)/a², and therefore (3) (y-z) = ±sqrt[b²-4ac]/a. Together, (1) and (3) form a simple linear system that yields the quadratic formula.

[1] This can either be see from factoring or easy tricks like substraction: a(x²-y²) + b(x-y) = 0, so a(x+y) = -b, etc. The general form of these relations are the Vieta-Girard formulae. [Edit: mistaken for Newton-Girard formulae; fixed.]

I should have known you would do something more clever than anything I would do

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Hint: the algebra technique for solving equations of this type is called "completing the square". The technique involves keeping the equation in its original form so that the constant is on the right-hand side and the variable terms are on the left-hand side, and then adding a constant to both sides of the equation so that the left-hand side becomes a perfect square of the form (x+a)^2 where a is a constant. This allows you to take the square root of both sides of the equation and eliminate the squared term so that you can perform a simple algebraic re-arrangement to get a direct solution. All of you should have learned this technique in high-school algebra, and it is in fact how the quadratic equation was derived. If you know the technique, you should be able to derive the quadratic equation without having to memorize it.

My school failed me by not teaching this.

I've heard bad things about the Louisiana school system, but ... holy shit. They never covered it?

I was shown the quadratic formula with literally no explanation as to what it does or why it works. Just how to plug numbers into it.

Shall I call up that GIF about the Louisiana school system?

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

I do remember having something vaguely like that in my old math class, but I too ne'er had a real explaination of it, so I really don't remember how to solve them.

We just memorized and plugged. However, on that problem, I think she told us to factor, but in doing so, she always did it by trial and error, and I hate that shit. I have no idea how to randomly cycle through possibilities like she wanted.

[Molyneux]

My school failed me by not teaching this.

I've heard bad things about the Louisiana school system, but ... holy shit. They never covered it?

I was shown the quadratic formula with literally no explanation as to what it does or why it works. Just how to plug numbers into it.

Shall I call up that GIF about the Louisiana school system?

Me, too, in the New York public school system.
We learned to complete the square in HIGH school, although the teacher was horrified when he found out that we had never encountered it before.

[SpacedTeddyBear]

Taking Mr. Wong's hint as a challenge to do the problem without the standard technique of completing the square, take an equation in the form ax²+bx+c=0. Then, assuming two solutions, y and z, we should have (1) y+z = -b/a and (2) yz = c/a [1], so that y²-2yz+z² = b²/a² - 4c/a = (b²-4ac)/a², and therefore (3) (y-z) = ±sqrt[b²-4ac]/a. Together, (1) and (3) form a simple linear system that yields the quadratic formula.

[1] This can either be see from factoring or easy tricks like substraction: a(x²-y²) + b(x-y) = 0, so a(x+y) = -b, etc. The general form of these relations are the Vieta-Girard formulae. [Edit: mistaken for Newton-Girard formulae; fixed.]
_________________

Damn man. I would just love to swim inside your head for just a few minutes..... preferably tomorrow at about 7:00pm'ish when I have my first partial diff. eq. exam.

Anyways, the method of completing the square is something that I haven't been able to forget no matter how little I've used it. I think it was first covered when I was in 8th grade.

[wautd]

To everyone who speaks dutch: read and weep

[K. A. Pital]

Let me guess on my loose German connection... Science is politics? Many think that science is objective, however, it is not? Here we will discuss how science is a political instrument?

What kind of antiscientific bunk is that?

[wautd]

Let me guess on my loose German connection... Science is politics? Many think that science is objective, however, it is not? Here we will discuss how science is a political instrument?

What kind of antiscientific bunk is that?

You got that right

But there's also bull about conspierancy theories, New world order, UFO's etc...

It's like that board is invaded by conspierancy theorists and the bloody and the admins allow pretty much everything. Fuckers hijack nearly every topic

[FaxModem1]

In high school, I took AP Physics and Calculus, boy, I have felt like a dunce ever since. I sucked at both classes, I never knew what I was doing, and in tutorials, the teacher talked way over my head. I felt retarded, as if everyone in the world was smarter than me, and that I was an idiot, and there was nothing I could do about it.

Some nights, I was just crying because I couldn't do my homework(yes, I was one of those people who cries at not being able to do something.)

That feeling isn't fun, and sometimes it makes you want to go drive a car off a cliff. and I experienced that for a whole year, I think that's why most people don't like it, they feel like idiots. Today, I still wish I understood it, but I never have, maybe I can find a Calculus for dummies somewhere or something.

[lance]

He's trying to say you can get by in life without being particularly intelligent. This is absolutely true, but the problem here is people who dispute the ability of scientists to speak authoritatively on matters that really do require intelligence and higher education.

People like that need to be reminded that they exist at a lower intellectual level than the scientists they're dismissing. Hence the mathematical litmus test.

Actually I ment that even an idiot can become a scientist if he works hard enough at it. There will most likely be a limit to how far they could go, but an associates of science is likely far below that limit.

[Darth Wong]

Actually I ment that even an idiot can become a scientist if he works hard enough at it.

You're wrong. An idiot won't pass the courses unless he goes to a shitty school with lousy standards. Calculus alone will bring him to his knees. There are certain things in life you can accomplish with hard work despite below-average intelligence. A hard science degree from a decent school is not one of them.

When someone in a science faculty calls someone else an idiot, that idiot is still smarter than the average person. Or to put it another way, the guys who flunked out of my engineering program were at the top of their high school classes.

[kheegster]

You're wrong. An idiot won't pass the courses unless he goes to a shitty school with lousy standards. Calculus alone will bring him to his knees. There are certain things in life you can accomplish with hard work despite below-average intelligence. A hard science degree from a decent school is not one of them.

When someone in a science faculty calls someone else an idiot, that idiot is still smarter than the average person. Or to put it another way, the guys who flunked out of my engineering program were at the top of their high school classes.

I think 'idiot' is a statement of being rather than potential, as in it can both mean an intelligent person who's not willing to work hard and think, or someone who does work hard but is innately unintelligent.

I used to flunk math back in high-school because I was lazy and never studied, yet I'm now an astrophysics grad student. Does that make me an idiot or not?

[Darth Wong]

I think 'idiot' is a statement of being rather than potential, as in it can both mean an intelligent person who's not willing to work hard and think, or someone who does work hard but is innately unintelligent.

But not in the context of lance's statement which I was responding to, where he said that an idiot could become a scientist if he worked hard. In that context, "idiot" clearly refers to someone who actually has low intelligence.

I used to flunk math back in high-school because I was lazy and never studied, yet I'm now an astrophysics grad student. Does that make me an idiot or not?

Obviously not, since you did manage to pick up the pace and get with the program. But you were never actually a low-IQ case; you just had a problem with discipline.

[lance]

Actually I ment that even an idiot can become a scientist if he works hard enough at it.

You're wrong. An idiot won't pass the courses unless he goes to a shitty school with lousy standards. Calculus alone will bring him to his knees. There are certain things in life you can accomplish with hard work despite below-average intelligence. A hard science degree from a decent school is not one of them.

When someone in a science faculty calls someone else an idiot, that idiot is still smarter than the average person. Or to put it another way, the guys who flunked out of my engineering program were at the top of their high school classes.

Okay, I never found math really hard, I did terrible in it due to putting very little work into it, and I did recently flunk out of calculus because of this, I just assumed that if I could get to calculus without studying and come close to passing with my study habits then any moron could do it. Also things like organic chemistry really seems like just a lot of memorization and a little bit of algebra at this point. I am at a community college so that could be why. But I figure it shouldn't be that much harder. I will have to compare notes with some of my friends.

[aerius]

Okay, I never found math really hard, I did terrible in it due to putting very little work into it, and I did recently flunk out of calculus because of this, I just assumed that if I could get to calculus without studying and come close to passing with my study habits then any moron could do it. Also things like organic chemistry really seems like just a lot of memorization and a little bit of algebra at this point. I am at a community college so that could be why. But I figure it shouldn't be that much harder. I will have to compare notes with some of my friends.

There's a huge level of difference between courses at a decent university and community college stuff. I have a degree from university and later did a year of community college to pick up the certification I needed for a job, it was laughable. College was almost as easy as high school, I slept through or skipped most of my classes, did all my homework at the last minute or not at all and still came out with an A. I didn't buy a single textbook and took maybe 5-10 pages of notes for each class for an entire semester. It was a joke. In university, the material I covered in a year of college would've been taught in 3-4 weeks at most, and then we would've moved on to the real work.

[lance]

I have a degree from university and later did a year of community college to pick up the certification I needed for a job, it was laughable. College was almost as easy as high school, I slept through or skipped most of my classes, did all my homework at the last minute or not at all and still came out with an A. I didn't buy a single textbook and took maybe 5-10 pages of notes for each class for an entire semester. It was a joke. In university, the material I covered in a year of college would've been taught in 3-4 weeks at most, and then we would've moved on to the real work.

Sounds about right, except for calc, organic and chem. Those are the only two classes that I had put any work into. In the case of calc it wasn't nearly enough work.