Re: Sad textbooks. Bring on selfdebugging hypertext (where? where?)...

From: John Marlow (johnmarlow@gmx.net)
Date: Mon Jan 22 2001 - 20:23:32 MST


Comment from Richard Feynman, and a few links of interest on bad
textbooks and efforts to correct:

john marlow

"That's the way all the books were: They said things that were
useless, mixed-up, ambiguous, confusing, and partially incorrect. How
anybody can learn science from these books, I don't know, because
it's not science."
- {HYPERLINK "http://www.amasci.com/feynman.html"}Dr. Richard
Feynman, in "Surely you're Joking, Mr. Feynman"

Apparently, most of the books still ARE that way...
http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/curr279.shtml
http://www.edweek.org/ew/vol-18/38text.h18
http://www.cin.org/archives/apolo/199905/0599.html

http://www.ed.gov/databases/ERIC_Digests/ed282776.html

http://www.eskimo.com/~billb/miscon/miscon4.html#airf

On 22 Jan 2001, at 20:28, Technotranscendence wrote:

> On Sunday, January 14, 2001 4:37 PM Michael M. Butler butler@comp-lib.org
> wrote:
> > http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010114/us/textbook_errors_1.html
>
> No wonder Americans are so bad at geography!:)
>
> What I recommend is that anyone on this list who has kids in school actually
> look over the textbooks for errors. If you find any, point them out to your
> child and the teacher. Even go so far, if you have time, to point them out
> to the school board or whatever body controls the schools. Also, a letter
> to the publisher might also go along way to rectifying the problem.
>
> No incentive to do all this? Well, those scared of nanotechnology, just
> think what might happen if someone gets his or her figures out of a bad
> textbook. Might not created gray goo, but just might.:) Those afraid of
> AI, apply the same reasoning.:)
>
> Cheers!
>
> Daniel Ust
> http://uweb.superlink.net/neptune/
> Film recommendation: "The Color of Paradise."
>

John Marlow



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