Sum Up Your 165 Experience So Far In One Picture

Now that the third week of classes has passed, I can officially say that I am kerfuffled. Please just appreciate the irony with me of how the class on logic doesn't make any sense. But hey, it's not like I can't understand what the all knowing Heap is teaching to us, it's applying these facts myself in the problems given to us. There seems to be a wee gap between the understanding and usage of the symbols and concepts that have been taught. I'm not exactly the sharpest spoon in the drawer, so I know I'm really going to have to roll up my socks and study hard if I'm going to do well on the assignment. It's also not like I find the material boring. In fact I find the class very interesting, it's the fact that learning has to come with work that I really don't like. I found things like vaccous truth and tautologies interesting and understandable, but I know that I will have a hard time implementing these things in my own work.

Regarding what I'm struggling with, the translation of English into symbolic code is the thing that really grinds my gears about expressing yourself precisely. For this week's tutorial the problems consisted of converting English statements into the symbols we learned. One statement was "some courses have the same pre-requisites", and I tried to solve it after getting a better understanding about symbolic notation. After showing it to my solution to the T.A. they said while it was close, it was still wrong. The statement I made in mathematical notation was that "one course can be a prerequisite for multiple courses"and was not correct. Apparently a counter example for my statement is two classes that each have multiple pre-requistes but only have one in common. The expression should have described two classes that had all its pre-requisites in common. I do understand that I was a little off from the correct answer, but it made all the difference and my answer was wrong. And this got me thinking, if I need to be that precise for the rest of the course I'm going to be way off all the time. We're talking like missing a shot on net when the goalie's pulled off imprecise, like stormtrooper shooting imprecise. So I'm going to have pay close attention to what is required in the problems, cause the English language is a jerk in this class. Along with appreciating it, I now have learned to resent it. What this class has done to me!?!?

I Better Not Screw Up The First Post...

I admit I actually understand why the almighty Heap has made me write this blog. Being able to concisely express thoughts and communicate with others is an extremely important part of computer science that people often (try to) forget. As one of the rare Computer Science students who actually enjoys taking the occasional English class, I am completely okay with this assignment. However, I don't really understand what direction we need to take with writing this blog. Am I supposed to embrace the "math is totally sweet" tone and start using an overly enthusiastic tone? Should I start making raps about how cool math is, and excessively extol all the wonderful virtues of my recent learnings in class? Or should I try to shovel out loads of nonsensical drivel, monotonously droning on about the class in attempt to reach the absolute minimum requirements of this blog? Writing emotionless crap sounds more appealing, but I figure it would eventually be so painful I should just save myself the trouble and carve some proofs into my arms right now. I guess I'll just write in whatever tone I'm currently feeling; spice it up sometimes so I don't go crazy and off myself out of sheer boredom.

I definitely know I need to entertain myself while I'm writing this, or risk insanity. So in summary if you don't like this blog, go choke on a duck. 

Anyways I think 165 is pretty cool class, the main thing that interested me was how mathematical expressions are able to eliminate any ambiguity that the English language might pose. However the mathematical expressions need the English language to compliment it, as proofs can become dull and ironically incomprehensible to most when only math is articulated. I also found it amusing that the definition of what makes a good proof according to Heap is also comparable to an excellent work of literature. YOU SEE?!?! Isn't English completely relevant in Computer Science?!?! This makes this amazing blog about math completely worth it...... right?!?!? I am now completely assured that this blog will only serve to improve my understanding of the complexities of mathematical expressions and proofs. 

Oh god this is going to be a long semester.