Call me a nerd, but this is going to be wonderful!!!

Wolfram Language

Looks like Wolfram Research is about to release a stand-alone version of the mathematica core language.

Dan's Response

Hi Byronn, thanks for the questions. I imagine the Wolframs and Arthur Benjamin would be able to better answer them but I can tell you that I use Wolfram Alpha not as an end unto itself but as a means to an end. For instance, I was recently trying to answer this question and it resulted in a complicated equation with a radical. I fired up WA and entered in the equation and WA handled the calculation. Again, I handled the creative thought of coming up with the equation. WA handled the brute force solution of the equation. That's more or less my approach to educational technology. Regards, Dan Byronn's note: "this question" refers to http://threeacts.mrmeyer.com/tacocart/, which was down at the time of this post.

My Question to Dan Meyer

I have to admit that after completing a bachelor's degree, and recently an associates degree in order to change careers, I've been able to learn only enough math to pass various test. After viewing TED talks by you, the Wolfram brothers and Arthur Benjamin, I have discovered a new love of math based primarily on my need for my children to develop a better understanding of math concepts. What can I do to help them and adults like myself who want to explore maths, but are intimidated by our weak mathematical foundations? My nephew is a sophmore in high school and I want to stregthen his foundation with maths that are practical, useful and broad enough to help him understand math applications for programming, statistics, and research should he choose to study these topics or others. I have several questions: 1. How should I use a program like Wolfram's Mathematica to help children and adults? 2. Can this type of program help prepare them for standardized test? 3. Do you agree with Arthur Benjamin that maths should build toward statistics? If so, what should the order of courses be?

PART ONE: My hope for OUYA.

I started gaming with the Colecovision in 1982. The weird thing is that my sister and I never asked for the console - my father just bought it. He thought it would be cool for us to play. The same thing happened with the Atari 2600, he bought it and we played. The difference was that we loved to play that machine. It worked better and the controllers and games made more sense. Defender was the first game I ever beat. I remember just sitting there in front of the tv, joystick in hand, mesmerized by my starship and blasting the enemies while saving the little square people at the bottom of the screen. Gaming nirvana had been reached. The reason why geezers like myself (I'm 37) still love the 2600 is because we remember being lost in those simple games with simple graphics. In an effort not to give the complete history of gaming, I'll try to be brief – the price of games and consoles changed gaming, and it changed it in several ways. My father never complained about buying consoles when we were kids. The machines back then fit his budget. Today, they wouldn't. I'm not saying he's cheap, will just call him cash-conscious. I wish that it was that simple for me. Buying a console from the major three game companies means making a sizable investment. Because of this, my wife and I decided to go for Nintendo's Wii which had the perfect mix of price, great titles for the kids, and innovation in how we interacted with the games. Being and FPS fan and a tech junkie didn't help my decision. I had the first Xbox and the PS2 (before being a married father of three) and I missed playing Halo and GTA. Then, a wonderful thing occurred. As a gift, my mom gave us an Xbox 360 with Kinect for Christmas. I felt like a kid in a candy store. As a family, the Wii was great, but it was nothing like the Kinect. It brought unparalleled interaction and gameplay to the whole family. More and more, we found ourselves choosing the 360 for family fun over the Wii that started collecting dust on the tv stand. Until the robbery.

Element: Second Nature

I remember an issue of Transworld from my earliest days in skateboarding that I had to have kept for at least two years. It featured a gallery of artwork that had been created by skaters. For some reason, an image from that gallery stayed with me and showed up in my artwork in high school. With this new documentary Second Nature about Janne Sarrio, a former Element pro turned architect, that image came to mind once again. Skateboarding then and now has always made me take notice of, and appreciate my creativity and talents, in a way that nothing else in my life has ever done. I had a love of drawing that started with drawing houses. That moved on to graphic design and drafting. This beautiful film shows how Janne built those connections for his new profession with skateboarding. A journey many skaters make, but not shown this poetically. A wonderful film.

"Second Nature" A Documentary Film About Janne Saario from ELEMENT SKATEBOARDS on Vimeo.

!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT'S A GUNDAM !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!