December 2011
3 posts
1 tag
“We cannot teach people anything; we can only help them discover it within...”
– Galileo Galilei
8 tags
Another talk about the Futurama Theorem →
On December 7, 2011, I gave my second talk about the Futurama Theorem during the Plymouth State University Mathematics Seminar. The Futurama Theorem is a theorem about the symmetric group that was developed for and proved in the episode “The Prisoner of Benda” for the TV show Futurama. The theorem was proved by show writer Ken Keeler, who has a PhD in applied mathematics from Harvard.
The...
5 tags
Combinatorics and graph theory are cool
This semester I am teaching a course for freshman mathematics majors. The course is called Introduction to Formal Mathematics. One purpose of the course is to develop a tight-knit cohort of mathematics majors and another purpose is show them that mathematics is about more than “solve for $x$.” We do some problem solving, a little proof writing, and introduce them to a few topics they...
November 2011
3 posts
1 tag
“The obstacle is the path.”
– Zen saying, author unknown.
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Alfred and Evernote
I’m a big fan of using the Mac productivity tool Alfred and I use Evernote to store all sorts of snippets of information. Alfred is free, but if you purchase the power pack, you gain the ability to add custom scripts via Alfred extensions. While browsing the extension gallery, I stumbled on the Evernote extension by Kristian Hellquist that allows you to use Alfred to create a note in...
9 tags
Talk about the Futurama Theorem →
On November 3, 2011, I gave a talk in the Mathematics Forum at Gordon College about the Futurama Theorem. The Futurama Theorem is a theorem about the symmetric group that was developed for and proved in the episode “The Prisoner of Benda” for the TV show Futurama. The theorem was proved by show writer Ken Keeler, who has a PhD in applied mathematics from Harvard.
During the...
October 2011
6 posts
2 tags
3 tags
“Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty — a...”
– Bertrand Russell, Mysticism and logic
3 tags
Using Mendeley with BibTeX
Note: This post overlaps significantly with Mendeley’s blog post found here.
My current reference manager of choice is Mendeley, which is a free desktop and web solution designed for storing, annotating, and sharing research papers, discovering research data and collaborating online. It combines Mendeley Desktop, a PDF and reference management application (available for Mac, Linux, and...
5 tags
Why use inquiry-based learning (IBL)? →
Amélie G. Schinck from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo has written a great piece titled “Why use IBL?”, which is posted over on The Academy of Inquiry-Based Learning.
1 tag
double-spacing in LaTeX
I’m currently writing a grant proposal and the narrative is supposed to be double-spaced. As with most of my writing, I’m using $\LaTeX$. I’ve double-spaced a .tex document before, but I do it so infrequently that I needed to remind myself how do it. It seems the most comment technique is to make use of the setspace package, which you can find here if you don’t already...
3 tags
Quick LaTeX Guide
This page is a slimmed down version of a guide that I wrote for my students. The original page is located here However, I’m hoping that this post will be of general interest to those just getting started with $\LaTeX$.
For information on using $\LaTeX$ via ScribTeX or installing $\LaTeX$ on your own computer, go to the bottom of this page.
What is LaTeX?
LaTeX (pronounced...
