I don't disagree with the gist of your post, however I was referring to the inherent ability of individuals, not the issues with the educational system(s).
Put it this way, I was on the staff (a long time ago now) at a Computer Graphics research center. At a well known engineering school. The general shall we say "opinion" of the student body was that they excelled at math (and other sciences) but "couldn't tie a shoelace". Obviously this is a gross simplification, as many could do a whole lot AND math. But the fact remains that the admission process slanted strongly to high math scores on the SAT (aptitude test) over high scores on "soft" study areas. There were those who had a genuine difficulty writing and even speaking - not just a handful either.
Go to an "arts" school and the balance is usually tilted the other way.
The number of people who excel at BOTH areas is fairly low.
My other point was that people hit a "wall", beyond which no amount of effort will propel them past.
The only question is where one's "wall" is compared with that of others...
...just like the NBA and Major League Baseball, the number of individuals who make it to the league
is a small fraction of all "wannabe's" and out of that there are only a handful of "superstars".
The rest of us play in local leagues, and pretend that we're that good.
_-_-
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That is not so clear. Research by Carol Dweck at Stanford shows that some people are inclined to think they are limited in abilities, and other people are more inclined to believe they can keep growing and getting smarter. Children of the first type did better and attained more improvement when coached into thinking more like the second type. Of course, there is much more that I left out. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_Dweck http://mindsetonline.com/whatisit/about/index.html
I'd have to say that the mathematics for EE's is more than the mechanical engineers had to take.
Maybe then? I don't think it's really any different than what my younger brother took (ME). Maybe a discrete math class and some stats, but pretty sure it was the same. As far as having to keep *using* said math classes, yeah, lots more theory/math for us EE's than the non-fluids ME classes.
Of course I'm writing this as I take a mental break from writing derivations of Navier-Stokes equations for electrohydrodynamics for some revisions of a manuscript. The irony isn't entirely lost on me. 🙂
Most electronic design engineers do not need an extreme amount of math to design analog equipment. When I was in college, I had to take more math because I changed my major to Physics in my junior year, but generally the important thing was to recognize the principles of calculus, matrix algebra, and differential equations, but not necessarily to derive everything from scratch. One gets pretty rusty after 50 years of only doing electronic design engineering, that's for sure! We are not paid to develop everything from first principles, it would take too much time. We are supposed to use engineering handbooks that give straightforward equations that we can use to quickly solve whatever problem that is in front of us. In the early days, a slide rule or a scientific calculator was all we needed. Today, we have computer simulation on every desktop, and I suspect we will get even lazier, and the math will be almost irrelevant, almost like classical Greek and Latin are to most of us today.
They make some attempt here:
https://www.supermagnete.de/eng/Magnet-applications/The-world-s-simplest-electronic-train
Jan, that's easy. The battery conducts through the piece of coil between + and - and the attached strong magnets are propelled by the magfield thus created. The math to calculate the efficiency is the hard part 🙂
I had to be able to vector calculus (maxwells equations). surface and volume integrals. Leplace transforms and a few other things. The problem was all of this was done in the first year when you weren't going to use it until the 3rd year. At that age things only sank in properly if I knew it was of some use to me.
Since mostly forgotten, but hoping my daughter can remind me as she's doing maths and physics.
Since mostly forgotten, but hoping my daughter can remind me as she's doing maths and physics.
If you want to refresh your basics about electro-magnetism, Feynmans Lectures on Physics, Vol2 are a fine source.
nice push pull train.
you tube for the question youtube for the answer .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWW4kPjd4yc
Sure, but we are not all "equal".
Achieving one's "maximum" potential is not the same thing as everyone having equal potential or ability. This being the equivalent of the smartest and most learned humans, this is clearly not the case. So, again judging the abilities of others based on one's own is not the best idea.
_-_-
Agreed. It was the idea of hitting a brick wall that seemed a little too clear cut.
Anecdote about me hitting a soft wall:
When I was an undergrad, the guitarist in the band I played in was adamant that I had to learn complex variables immediately. "There's whole classes of integrals you can't solve without contour integration." Now, I prided myself on being pretty good at using basic tools to solve even tough-dog integrals, so I asked for an example that he thought I couldn't do without using the residue theorem. He gave me the integral of x^2/(1 + ln^2 x) from 0 to infinity. I set to working it out by parts, and after a few hours, got a constant plus the integral of x/(1 + ln^2 x) over the same limits. I was working through the latter when my QM professor (also my advisor) walked by. He was slightly deaf so always shouted. "HEY STU WHATCHA DOIN'?" "Oh, I'm solving an integral Rick gave me. I have most of it, now I have to work out this last term." He stared at it for about 5 seconds, cheerfully shouted, "IT'S ZERO," and walked away.
He was right, which took me another hour to determine. And that was my first clue that I could be pretty good at theory, but not at the level I wanted to be. But I did solve it without a contour integral!
When I was an undergrad, the guitarist in the band I played in was adamant that I had to learn complex variables immediately. "There's whole classes of integrals you can't solve without contour integration." Now, I prided myself on being pretty good at using basic tools to solve even tough-dog integrals, so I asked for an example that he thought I couldn't do without using the residue theorem. He gave me the integral of x^2/(1 + ln^2 x) from 0 to infinity. I set to working it out by parts, and after a few hours, got a constant plus the integral of x/(1 + ln^2 x) over the same limits. I was working through the latter when my QM professor (also my advisor) walked by. He was slightly deaf so always shouted. "HEY STU WHATCHA DOIN'?" "Oh, I'm solving an integral Rick gave me. I have most of it, now I have to work out this last term." He stared at it for about 5 seconds, cheerfully shouted, "IT'S ZERO," and walked away.
He was right, which took me another hour to determine. And that was my first clue that I could be pretty good at theory, but not at the level I wanted to be. But I did solve it without a contour integral!
"Agreed. It was the idea of hitting a brick wall that seemed a little too clear cut. "
That's simply when you run out of IQ. It hits normal people quite early on in their lives.
Reminds me of all the HRM b.s. I had to endure in my corporate life about the 'war for talent'.
That's simply when you run out of IQ. It hits normal people quite early on in their lives.
Reminds me of all the HRM b.s. I had to endure in my corporate life about the 'war for talent'.
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