How Children Succeed QQC

Quote: "As a result, American college campuses became less elite and more diverse"

Questions: Is diversity to blame for the stalling of the higher education system? Can't diversity help higher education by helping find a wider variety of successful graduates?

Comment: This quote is interesting to me because, although it's important for all kinds of people to get a good education, the more people who have college degrees the more the values of the college degree decreases. I guess it could be argued however that, a more prestigious degree will help someone stand out better to a potential employer, but that will just start the process over again, and eventually all degree will be equally prestigious.

Drive QCCQ

Quote: "the best predictor of success, the researchers found, was the prospective cadet's ratings on a noncognitive, non-physical trait known as "grit"- defined as perseverance, and passion for long term goals."

Comment: This quote is interesting because because it talks about how success isn't determined from how smart you are, or how strong you are, but how passionate you are about your goal.

Connection: It reminds me of the last reading of nature verses nuture, but this quote is more supporting the nuture arguement than the nature, due to the fact that it is saying cognitive and physical traits, that you might have been born with, aren't as important as grit. It also reminds me of the movie Captain America, in the scene where they're talking about how one soldier is a good because of his strength, but then when they test for bravery they find that Captain America really has the grit that they need.

Question: How do they exactly to they test for "grit"? If it's a noncognitive, non-physical trait, how do you test if someone has it? Wouldn't grit be a state of mind and therefore a cognitive trait?

QCCQ Mindset

Quote: "In sports, everybody believes in talent. Even- or especially- the experts. In fact sports is where the idea of "a natural" come from- someone who looks like athlete, moves like an athlete, and is an athlete all without trying."
Comment: I like this quote because of how true it is. There's always some athletes who are very experienced and are good because of that experience, but there are also people who are just good without trying and don't have practice all the time.
Connection: The part where they mention that especially the experts believe in talent, because I always hear sports announcers mentioning natural talent during college football games.
Question: Is it better to be a natural, or to have learned from experience?

Leibniz QCCQ

Quote: "Leibniz is probably better known to most people as a philosopher than as a mathematician. The history of philosophy has long recognized him as one of its greatest system builders, and also the producer of most of the ammunition with which Kant later attacked Hume."

Comment: It's interesting that many things in math can be connected to philosophy, and that Leibniz could not only contribute to Calculus, but also psychology by influencing Kant and Hume with his ideas.

Connection: This reminds me a lot of how Dave sometimes puts quotes from philosophy on the board, and also tries to get us to think about the bigger picture when we are learning new things.

Question: Where people like Newton, and Einstein considered philosophers? Is it possible to be a mathematician without contributing to philosophy?

Newton QCCQ

Quote: The Principia was written in 18 incredible months of total concentration, and when it was published in 1687 it was immediately recognized as one of the supreme achievements of the human mind."

Comment: It's interesting that the three laws of motion came from this book that was written more than 300 years ago and we still use those laws today, and how much it contributes to modern physics. It also shows how much sitting down and concentrating on something important for a long period of time can make a long lasting work that benefits millions of people.

Connection: When we studied physics freshman year the main focus that was connected to Newtons laws of physics, which Newton wrote about in the Principia.

Question: By "18 incredible months of total concentration" do they mean that he just stayed in a room working on his laws?

QQC chapter 5

Quote: "Among the questions that attracted interest in that fanatically inquisitive age was one that had puzzled people for a very long time—namely, why ancient clamshells and other marine fossils were so often found on mountaintops. How on earth did they get there? Those who thought they had a solution fell into two opposing camps. One group, known as the Neptunists, was convinced that everything on Earth, including seashells in improbably lofty places, could be explained by rising and falling sea levels. They believed that mountains, hills, and other features were as old as the Earth itself, and were changed only when water sloshed over them during periods of global flooding. "

Question: When they say they "changed only when water sloshed over them during periods of global flooding" are they talking about erosion or are they talking about the changing of what is above sea level?

Comment: This topic is really interesting because it's something most people wonder about breifly, but don't put serious thought behind, and its cool that these two groups of people have such strong theories as to why it happens.

QQC Chapter 4

Quote: "Halley was an exceptional figure. In the course of a long and productive career, he was a
sea captain, a cartographer, a professor of geometry at the University of Oxford, deputy
controller of the Royal Mint, astronomer royal, and inventor of the deep-sea diving bell. He
wrote authoritatively on magnetism, tides, and the motions of the planets, and fondly on the
effects of opium. He invented the weather  map and actuarial table, proposed methods for
working out the age of the Earth and its distance from the Sun, even devised a practical
method for keeping fish fresh out of season. The one thing he didn't do, interestingly enough,
was discover the comet that bears his name."

Question: "Where did he find the time to do all of this?"

Comment: It's interesting how he did all of these things but was mostly just honored by having a comet that he didn't discover be named after him. It's also interesting how most of the things he did connect to being a sea captain.