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Groups > rec.arts.sf.written > #489828

Re: Going Back To The Well Again

From D B Davis <g@crcomp.net>
Newsgroups rec.arts.sf.written
Subject Re: Going Back To The Well Again
Date 2018-04-07 21:33 +0000
Organization A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID <20180407a@crcomp.net> (permalink)
References (6 earlier) <fihf5eFmu3pU1@mid.individual.net> <20180403a@crcomp.net> <2NidnUbEc9_XBFnHnZ2dnUU7-d3NnZ2d@earthlink.com> <2cc9cdt0ba4s739ttl09r9etov2seuni31@4ax.com> <d0311e58-bc2a-4772-9e55-51089a02697c@googlegroups.com>

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Kevrob <kevrob@my-deja.com> wrote:

<snip>

> I never even took calculus, and I know that differential equations
> are used in probability and statistics.  I did take some stats in
> college, and I was a humanities guy, not a STEM student.  Stats
> is useful for things like public opinion polling, which I also
> studied.  It might have been wiser to have taken calculus, as my high
> school offered it, but nobody ever mentioned to me at the time that
> it would be useful for a PoliSci major.  In retrospect, I might have
> made some coin if I had gone into survey research, instead of falling
> into bookselling.  I enjoyed selling books, but it didn't pay.

_Quick Calculus, A Self-Teaching Guide _ (Kleppner and Ramsey) walks
you through everything you need to know in 262 pages. Don't let The
Calculus baffle-gab you. You're bright enough to master the Kleppner in
a few weeks, if you put your mind to it.
    That was my ploy back in college. "Autodidact" (so to speak) the
nearest text then test out of The Calculus and move on to more
interesting things.
    More interesting things, such as "De Motu" (Berkeley) [1]. The only
rub is that Berkeley wrote it in Latin. There's a high priced Jesseph
translation (the "element 79" standard of translations) and a far
cheaper Ayers translation available. The Ayers is now on its way to me,
naturally.
    At first blush it seemed like Dartmouth's math department hosted a
"De Motu" translation [2], but that proves to be a false lead. Even
though it's a false lead, it /does/ offer up a measure of entertainment,
at least to me. YMMV.

    6 And yet in the calculus differentialis, which method serves
    to all the same intents and ends with that of fluxions, our
    modern analysts are not content to consider only the differences
    of finite quantities: they also consider the differences of those
    differences, and the differences of the differences of the first
    differences. And so on ad infinitum. That is, they consider
    quantities infinitely less than the least discernible quantity;
    and others infinitely less than those infinitely small ones; and
    still others infinitely less than the preceding infinitesimals,
    and so on without end or limit. Insomuch that we are to admit an
    infinite succession of infinitesimals, each infinitely less than
    the foregoing, and infinitely greater than the following. As
    there are first, second, third, fourth, fifth, &c. fluxions, so
    there are differences, first, second, third, fourth, &c., in an
    infinite progression towards nothing, which you still approach
    and never arrive at. And (which is most strange) although you
    should take a million of millions of these infinitesimals, each
    whereof is supposed infinitely greater than some other real
    magnitude, and add them to the least given quantity, it shall
    never be the bigger. For this is one of the modest postulata of
    our modern mathematicians, and is a corner-stone or ground-work
    of their speculations.

    7 All these points, I say, are supposed and believed by certain
    rigorous exactors of evidence in religion, men who pretend to
    believe no further than they can see. That men who have been
    conversant only about clear points should with difficulty admit
    obscure ones might not seem altogether unaccountable. But he who
    can digest a second or third fluxion, a second or third
    difference, need not, methinks, be squeamish about any point in
    divinity. ...

    ROTFLMAO.

Note.

1. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/39746/39746-h/39746-h.html#toc53
2. https://math.dartmouth.edu/~matc/Readers/HowManyAngels/Analyst/Analyst.html

--
Don

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Going Back To The Well Again David Johnston <davidjohnston29@yahoo.com> - 2018-03-26 12:33 -0600
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again a425couple <a425couple@hotmail.com> - 2018-03-26 12:08 -0700
    Re: Going Back To The Well Again Dimensional Traveler <dtravel@sonic.net> - 2018-03-26 12:59 -0700
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again Johnny1A <johnny1a.again@gmail.com> - 2018-04-25 13:47 -0700
    Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-03-26 20:47 +0000
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again Butch Malahide <fred.galvin@gmail.com> - 2018-03-27 13:15 -0700
        Re: Going Back To The Well Again wroehl@gmail.com - 2018-03-27 17:08 -0700
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again David DeLaney <daviddelaney@earthlink.net> - 2018-04-02 03:40 -0500
        Re: Going Back To The Well Again Greg Goss <gossg@gossg.org> - 2018-04-02 20:12 -0600
          Re: Going Back To The Well Again "Default User" <defaultuserbr@yahoo.com> - 2018-04-03 04:49 +0000
          Re: Going Back To The Well Again peterwezeman@hotmail.com - 2018-04-02 23:29 -0700
            Re: Going Back To The Well Again Greg Goss <gossg@gossg.org> - 2018-04-03 07:50 -0600
              Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-03 17:02 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Carl Fink <carlf@panix.com> - 2018-04-03 17:34 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-04 13:30 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Carl Fink <carlf@panix.com> - 2018-04-05 17:22 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-05 18:27 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Carl Fink <carlf@panix.com> - 2018-04-05 19:04 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Robert Carnegie <rja.carnegie@excite.com> - 2018-04-05 13:36 -0700
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Carl Fink <carlf@panix.com> - 2018-04-06 11:33 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-05 21:57 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-24 17:01 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) - 2018-04-05 19:09 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Carl Fink <carlf@panix.com> - 2018-04-06 11:34 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again David DeLaney <daviddelaney@earthlink.net> - 2018-04-04 04:22 -0500
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2018-04-04 07:09 -0400
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Kevrob <kevrob@my-deja.com> - 2018-04-04 06:50 -0700
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again David DeLaney <daviddelaney@earthlink.net> - 2018-04-07 01:07 -0500
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2018-04-07 07:27 -0400
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Kevrob <kevrob@my-deja.com> - 2018-04-07 07:19 -0700
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again David DeLaney <daviddelaney@earthlink.net> - 2018-04-07 20:33 -0500
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2018-04-07 21:54 -0400
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-07 21:33 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) - 2018-04-07 22:08 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Kevrob <kevrob@my-deja.com> - 2018-04-07 16:46 -0700
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again "artyw2@yahoo.com" <artyw2@yahoo.com> - 2018-04-04 07:55 -0700
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again Carl Fink <carlf@panix.com> - 2018-04-04 13:44 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again D B Davis <g@crcomp.net> - 2018-04-04 13:45 +0000
                Re: Going Back To The Well Again J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2018-04-04 07:05 -0400
          YASID - finding your home dimension by its bridge design. Greg Goss <gossg@gossg.org> - 2018-04-03 07:51 -0600
          Re: Going Back To The Well Again "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <seawasp@sgeinc.invalid.com> - 2018-04-04 20:09 -0400
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again Titus G <noone@nowhere.com> - 2018-03-27 09:29 +1300
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again ted@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan <tednolan>) - 2018-03-26 20:46 +0000
    Re: Going Back To The Well Again Johnny1A <johnny1a.again@gmail.com> - 2018-03-26 22:11 -0700
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again David Johnston <davidjohnston29@yahoo.com> - 2018-03-26 23:20 -0600
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again Johnny1A <johnny1a.again@gmail.com> - 2018-03-26 22:05 -0700
    Re: Going Back To The Well Again David Johnston <davidjohnston29@yahoo.com> - 2018-03-26 23:25 -0600
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again Juho Julkunen <giaotanj@hotmail.com> - 2018-03-27 18:31 +0300
        Re: Going Back To The Well Again David Johnston <davidjohnston29@yahoo.com> - 2018-03-27 12:37 -0600
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again David DeLaney <daviddelaney@earthlink.net> - 2018-04-02 03:44 -0500
        Re: Going Back To The Well Again Gene Wirchenko <genew@telus.net> - 2018-04-02 12:38 -0700
        Re: Going Back To The Well Again Johnny1A <johnny1a.again@gmail.com> - 2018-04-25 13:52 -0700
  Going Back To The Well Again Quadibloc <jsavard@ecn.ab.ca> - 2018-03-27 08:43 -0700
    Re: Going Back To The Well Again David Johnston <davidjohnston29@yahoo.com> - 2018-03-27 12:38 -0600
      Re: Going Back To The Well Again djheydt@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) - 2018-03-27 19:45 +0000
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com> - 2018-03-27 11:52 -0700
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again David DeLaney <daviddelaney@earthlink.net> - 2018-04-02 03:38 -0500
    Re: Going Back To The Well Again Steve Coltrin <spcoltri@omcl.org> - 2018-04-02 18:39 -0600
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again "artyw2@yahoo.com" <artyw2@yahoo.com> - 2018-04-02 19:50 -0700
  Re: Going Back To The Well Again "artyw2@yahoo.com" <artyw2@yahoo.com> - 2018-04-02 19:52 -0700

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