TITLE: Quotes of the Week, in Four Dimensions
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: May 31, 2013  1:44 PM
DESC: 
-----
BODY:
<B>Engineering</B>.

Michael Bernstein, in
<A HREF="http://michaelrbernste.in/2013/05/28/a-generation-ago-a-thoroughly-modern-sampling.html">
   A Generation Ago, A Thoroughly Modern Sampling</A>:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 The AI Memos are an extremely fertile ground for modern research.
 While it's true that what this group of pioneers thought was
 impossible then may be possible now, it's even clearer that some
 things we think are impossible now have been possible all along.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

When I was in grad school, we read a lot of new and recent
research papers.  But the most amazing, most educational, and
most inspiring stuff I read was <EM>old</EM>.  That's often true
today as well.

<B>Science</B>.

Financial Agile
<A HREF="https://twitter.com/financialagile/status/340483390186856449">
   tweets</A>:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 "If it disagrees with experiment, it's wrong".  Classic.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

... with a link to
<A HREF="http://financialagile.uglyduckling.nl/reflection/the-scientific-method-with-feynman/">
   The Scientific Method with Feynman</A>,
which has a wonderful ten-minute video of the physicist
explaining how science works.  Among its important points is
that <EM>guessing</EM> is huge part of science.  It's just
that scientists have a way of telling which guesses are right
and which are wrong.

<B>Teaching</B>.

James Boyk, in
<A HREF="http://jamesboyk.com/?p=32">
   Six Words</A>:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 Like others of superlative gifts, he seemed to think the
 less gifted could do as well as he, if only they knew a
 few powerful specifics that could readily be conveyed.
 Sometimes he was right!
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

"He" is Leonid Hambro, who played with Victor Borge and P. D. Q.
Bach but was also well-known as a teacher and composer.  Among
my best teachers have been some extraordinarily gifted people.
I'm thankful for the time they tried to convey their insights
to the likes of me.

<B>Art</B>.

Amanda Palmer, in
<A HREF="http://vimeo.com/65681037">
   a conference talk</A>:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 We can only connect the dots that we collect.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

Palmer uses this sentence to explain in part why all art is
about the artist, but it means something more general, too.
You can build, guess, and teach only with the raw materials
that you assemble in your mind and your world.  So collect
lots of dots.  In this more prosaic sense, Palmer's sentence
applies to not only to art but also to engineering, science,
and teaching.
-----