Measurement, Classification, Space and Time
Introduction
I agree that making people think is by far more important
than getting them to learn " stuff" . This changes, the need
to solve problems and think creatively does not.
Links of interest
Problem
Solving
Creative,
Lateral, Logical Thinking
Measurement
Ordinal measurements
You can't add; they're positions, a place in line or a
queue
Accuracy and significance
Estimations are just that, and can't be relied upon, especially
if you're guessing how far a car will drive!
Theory of Measurement
exact measurement easy; comparative less so
90% twice as good as 45% I don't know, sometimes, but not really. Obvious
that most measurement depends on where you're starting from and what
you're measuring.
As my daughter says, when she was young (!) maths was good because it
was exact: you got it right or wrong and then in upper school, it sort
of "ish"
Most measurement of social change is nothing like 2 or 3 more like 133
factors that interrelate.
Theory of Classification
Classifications are always blurry, to a larger or lesser degree
Space and Time
It's fascinating that space and time are not the obvious.
Also interesting that for a lot of practical purposes Newton's ideas
still describe most of what happens.
It's also stunning that everything follows the line of least resistance
(maybe that's why humans hate change too.
Intuitive Time
Time can't flow, but it does seem to disappear.
All kinds of different theories are around. The Jews used to (still?)
believe that we walk backwards into the future. The ideas about past
and future vary enormously. Lots of sci-fi writers explore theses ideas.
Would going back into the past change the future or if you did you have?
Irreversible and Inexorable Time
Our concept of death and possible future obviously change the way we
view life.
Backwards time doesn't make much sense. We don't ever see things unmake
but we do see see things change. The "second law" backs this
up.
Irreversible and Inexorable Time: Contraindications
Einstein's relativity changes the "commonsense" nature of
time; on the other hand subjective time has always varied in duration!
Cyclic vs. Linear Time
How do we measure time/years/seconds; all deliciously tied with ancient
ideas of moon and stars.
And Now It Gets Weird
time dilation
Clocks and people moving at different times interesting but the time
differences in our everyday lives are pretty small.
Black holes:
used an awful lot in science fiction. There's something awful and fascinating
about a phenomenon that swallows everything even light.
Wormholes.
Startrek TV shows love wormholes! Babylon Five and Deep Space Nine exist
beside clusters of them. They don't turn into spaghetti but sometimes
have bumpy rides!
cyclic time where the universe runs backwards. I so how believe Hawking
By that time there wouldn't be any life as we know it around to complain
about time flowing backwards.
The Mind of God
idea where God doesn't have a choice in His creation if he wanted to
go unnoticed, sounds sensible to me.
Whether it will always be a mystery or not really doesn't matter; people
are going to keep asking questions!
Spacetime101
Nifty car pictures to describe quite difficult concepts! I'm not sure
it's true that the maths is easy!
I like the comment
Isn't that clever? How could nature be that smart?
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