Dec 31 2008
Think Differently
From Slashdot:
A couple of times a year, I pull up the following and read it, trying to realign my thinking process. I don’t know who originally wrote it; I’ve had it for years. I apologize for the long post, but it’s worth it.
Some time ago I received a call from a colleague. He was about to give a student a zero for his answer to a physics question, while the student claimed a perfect score. The instructor and the student agreed to an impartial arbiter, and I was selected.I read the examination question:
“SHOW HOW IT IS POSSIBLE TO DETERMINE THE HEIGHT OF A TALL BUILDING WITH THE AID OF A BAROMETER.”
The student had answered, “Take the barometer to the top of the building, attach a long rope to it, lower it to the street, and then bring it up, measuring the length of the rope. The length of the rope is the height of the building.” The student really had a strong case for full credit since he had really answered the question completely and correctly! On the other hand, if full credit were given, it could well contribute to a high grade in his physics course and to certify competence in physics, but the answer did not confirm this. I suggested that the student have another try. I gave the student six minutes to answer the question with the warning that the answer should show some knowledge of physics. At the end of five minutes, he had not written anything. I asked if he wished to give up, but he said he had many answers to this problem; he was just thinking of the best one. I excused myself for interrupting him and asked him to please go on. In the next minute, he dashed off his answer which read:
“Take the barometer to the top of the building and lean over the edge of the roof. Drop the barometer, timing its fall with a stopwatch. Then, using the formula x=0.5*a*t^^2, calculate the height of the building.”
At this point, I asked my colleague if he would give up. He conceded, and gave the student almost full credit. While leaving my colleague’s office, I recalled that the student had said that he had other answers to the problem, so I asked him what they were. “Well,” said the student, “there are many ways of getting the height of a tall building with the aid of a barometer. For example, you could take the barometer out on a sunny day and measure the height of the barometer, the length of its shadow, and the length of the shadow of the building,and by the use of simple proportion, determine the height of the building.” “Fine,” I said, “and others?” “Yes,” said the student, “there is a very basic measurement method you will like. In this method, you take the barometer and begin to walk up the stairs. As you climb the stairs, you mark off the length of the barometer along the wall. You then count the number of marks, and this will give you the height of the building in barometer units.” “A very direct method, of course.”
If you want a more sophisticated method, you can tie the barometer to the end of a string, swing it as a pendulum, and determine the value of g at the street level and at the top of the building. From the difference between the two values of g, the height of the building,in principle, can be calculated.” “On this same tact, you could take the barometer to the top of the building, attach a long rope to it, lower it to just above the street, and then swing it as a pendulum. You could then calculate the height of the building by the period of the precession”. “Finally,” he concluded, “there are many other ways of solving the problem. Probably the best,” he said, “is to take the barometer to the basement and knock on the superintendent’s door. When the superintendent answers, you speak to him as follows: “Mr. Superintendent, here is a fine barometer. If you will tell me the height of the building, I will give you this barometer.” At this point, I asked the student if he really did not know the conventional answer to this question. He admitted that he did, but said that he was fed up with high school and college instructors trying to teach him how to think. The student was Neils Bohr.
December 31st, 2008 at 4:34 pm
Thanks Derek,
great reminder…,fun read
i loved physics class and applying it to running and jumping in the hills
Of course, the poser here is: am I on the right planet?
December 31st, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Hi Tom,
Thanks for the comment. I was lucky enough to have an awesome physics teacher who changed my world forever by allowing us to launch water balloons at her. I was more impressed when she didn’t move as one actually hit her.
Thanks for reading and for the comment.
Cheers,
Kendall
January 1st, 2009 at 9:58 am
I was exactly the same when at school. I found it exhaustive and depressing and behaved in this exact manner of facetious non-compliance.
I had a physics teacher who refused to teach things exactly as was written in the curriculum because, in his own words, it was “just wrong”. He would go as far as saying “this is what the curriculum says I have to teach you…” and show us, then point out why it was wrong. He used to say “I don’t care about the bloody curriculum. It’s all cobblers. I refuse to teach you something that is patently wrong.”
I had a relatively unpleasant time in my school days so don’t remember much of it (not that it was terribly long ago). I have vague memories of the majority of the teachers who taught me at some point, but my clearest most influential recollections are those of that physics teacher. I wish they were all like that!
AJT
January 1st, 2009 at 11:19 am
AJT,
Thanks for sharing! Interesting how we force some to comply based on tradition that was started way back. Thanks for reaching out.
Be well,
Kendall
January 1st, 2009 at 11:45 am
Ooh, what a great post to end the year. I feel inspired — thanks!
January 1st, 2009 at 3:38 pm
http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/barometer.asp
January 2nd, 2009 at 6:33 am
damn…talk abt thinkin out of the box
January 5th, 2009 at 1:28 am
Joe, Twells, Sherief,
Thanks for stopping by and sharing with us. I had not seen that site Twells, very detailed. Thanks for the link!
Sincerely,
Kendall
January 5th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
I am glad he did not give up.
January 6th, 2009 at 11:36 pm
This is simply wonderful! I enjoyed reading this very much. So THANKS A LOT for sharing this.
…and I might add…I was equally surprised and proud to see that it was a ‘fellow Dane’ being that clever! (well a bit more famous than me LOL…yet!);-))
Singer Songwriter & Nashville Recording Artist, Denmark
Ulla Lindstroem
January 9th, 2009 at 1:32 pm
[...] last post on thinking differently received some great comments. Thank you! We love having a conversation with [...]
January 13th, 2009 at 2:38 pm
[...] Think Differently Some time ago I received a call from a colleague. He was about to give a student a zero for his answer to a physics question, while the student claimed a perfect score. The instructor and the student agreed to an impartial arbiter, and I was selected.I read the examination question: [...]
January 27th, 2009 at 9:58 pm
Great! Thank you very much!
I always wanted to write in my blog something like that. Can I take part of your post to my blog?
Of course, I will add backlink?
Sincerely, Timur I.
January 28th, 2009 at 10:53 pm
[...] I think a lot of the problems are summed up well here. In the meantime, let’s all just think differently and remember what Brandon Marsalis [...]
February 2nd, 2009 at 5:07 pm
@Timur Feel free. I saw this on slashdot.
Enjoy.
April 27th, 2009 at 10:32 pm
[...] April 27, 2009 by Random Here is a guy that thinks for himself. And he happened to be right. Don’t let other people tell you how to think. [...]
May 14th, 2009 at 8:43 pm
It’s somewhat rare for students to enjoy their jobs in college. I know my first internship in college showed me that I didn’t want to work in that industry.
Sometimes just working at the school cafeteria can be the perfect fit for a student. It beats filing papers all day in a cubicle, and you usually get some free food!
July 21st, 2009 at 2:16 pm
Pretty cool post. I just stumbled upon your blog and wanted to say
that I have really liked reading your blog posts. Anyway
I’ll be subscribing to your blog and I hope you post again soon!
July 21st, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Thanks for the comment! We’re happy to have happy readers. Thanks for stopping by!
Be well.
September 25th, 2009 at 10:30 pm
Thats very good to know… thanks
October 8th, 2009 at 3:04 am
That was a great post, thanks for sharing. I never really liked school and it was great to hear that he never gave up wow physics something I would never have taken as a subject I am not that clever.