I am still recovering from sleepless night before Tuesday meeting with the frightening regulator "monster", and the Wednesday lecture on a complicated fluid mechanics problem. Yesterday was also a "lost day" of little productivity. One could assume that at my post-retirement age all days would be unproductive and "lost", yet I feel the need to commit public self-criticism for working less than two average persons.
In S
teve Hsu's blog I came about to the jewel of an expression "Stochastic Calculus Porn" by Arnold Kling. The complete quote:
But the economics profession for the past thirty years instead focused on producing stochastic calculus porn to satisfy young men's urge for mathematical masturbation.
I teach Fluid Mechanics and other "hard" subjects, and I do feel the students's hunger for problems that can be solved by mechanical manipulation of mathematical objects. Hydraulics textbooks are full of long equations that give the impression of simple linear/mechanical universe, yet they are useless to solve real life problems. I prided myself in bringing real life situations to the classroom, situations I'm forced to solve in my consulting work, but the students and my collegues hate them, feel that they are "unreal". The young Jews that I am trying to teach
demand to be fed calculus porn. Therefore I am feeding them textbook problems. I observe how they get high and achieve great satisfaction, I could exaggerate and say a physical orgasm, when they hit on the textbook solution. I think this is what Prof. Arnold Kling refers to. But teaching is a paying job and I have to supply what the market demands.
8 comments:
Economic modeling never predicts the real world because it is always based upon certain assumptions that don't exist in the real world.
This reminds me of an ancient joke - a chemist, a physicist and an economist are shipwrecked on an island and all they have to eat are some canned goods that were in the lifeboat. Unfortunately the can opener washed overboard.
The physicist says, "let's heat the can to the point where the internal pressure is greater than the strength of the seal - the can will then burst open . The others point out that they have nothing with which to light a fire.
The chemist suggest that they soak the can in seawater. The sodium chloride will oxidize the steel and well be able to get to the contents. The others point out that they would starve to death before that process would be complete.
Finally, they ask the economist what to do? He replies, " Very simple - assume a can opener."
K
Hydraulics textbooks are full of long equations that give the impression of simple linear/mechanical universe, yet they are useless to solve real life problems.
Why are they useless in real world?
Calculate pollutant dispersion of a field fertilized with wastewater treatment plant sludge. You have USEPA AEMOD simulation model and you have the algoritms, yet they are useless in real life. You just dont have half of the parameters you need to feed the model and the model is already contains many (hidden) suppositions (guesses) you are unaware of.
Calculate the effect of air trapped in a real life water distribution network. In the book it looks simple, in work situation you cant measure even the friction coefficient for the pipes (of different ages, bent and repaired in the past) making up the system.
"Assume a coefficient".
K
In the book it looks simple, in work situation you cant measure even the friction coefficient for the pipes (of different ages, bent and repaired in the past) making up the system.
You are hated by students and academics for pointing out this?
Of course, in real life we assume the coefficients.
Regarding hate, I stopped confusing the students and now I use only neat textbook problems and solutions to make them happy.
The funny thing about all of this calculus porn is that the LA water system was built by a man who left school at the age of 15 in order to join the British Merchant Marine.
Building grand water systems from scratch requires a grand vision, solving minor problems takes teams of engineers years using the most advanced mathematical models.
I need to check the little box before submitting my comments.
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