Having just written about issues of wording with regard to percentages, we should look at another wording issue that touches on percentages and several other matters of wording. What does “three times larger” mean? How about “300% more”? We’ll focus on one discussion that involved several of us, and referred back to other answers we’ve …
(An archive question of the week) Having looked at the matter of faces, edges, and vertices from several different perspectives, I want to look at one more question and answer, to tie it all together. Definitions The question is from 2008: Definitions of Edge and Face in 2D and 3D Different resources define “edge” in …
(An archive question of the week) Many calculus courses start out with a chapter on limits; or they may be introduced in a “precalculus” course. But too often the concept is not sufficiently motivated. What good are limits? Why did they have to be invented? Are they as simple as they seem? Why is an epsilon-delta …
(An archive problem of the week) Having just discussed quartiles, I want to look at related issues concerning percentiles. There, I briefly mentioned different perspectives on the concept of quartile, and focused on differences in the details of the calculations; here I will focus mostly on the different perspectives, and then touch on variations in …
(An archive question of the week) One of the discussions we looked at last time involved rolling three dice and getting at least one six. I didn’t go into detail on the calculation there; but I found another place where we discussed it at length. We’ll look at that here. A wrong way and a …
(An archive question of the week) Last time I surveyed what we have said about the volume of liquid in various kinds of tanks. One more special case I ran across deserved more detailed attention, because it demonstrates in detail how to do the calculations without much knowledge of calculus. The problem Here is the …
(An archive question of the week) Last time we looked at various 2- and 3-set Venn diagram problems (and alternative methods). One discussion I found while collecting them deserved to be set aside for special examination, if only because it would scare the beginner. A mixture of tools will make the work easier. Here it …
(An archive problem of the week) A couple weeks ago, in discussing the value of estimates, I included one example of a (very simple) Fermi problem: one in which it is necessary to invent the data as well as the method of solution. Today, I will examine one answer in which we dug deeper into …
(An archive question of the week) Last time, as part of our series on estimation, we looked at some numerical methods for solving equations approximately. I mentioned the Method of False Position, but when I looked for more detailed expositions in our archive, I realized that in a sense it is really two different things, …
(An archive question of the week) Last time I looked at reasons for learning to estimate. In searching for answers on that topic, I ran across a question that touches not just on reasons for estimation, but on other ways to check an answer, and on some of the specific ideas we will be looking …