I’ve written before about the evils of grading (for example, see here and here), the main purpose of which is to make certifying students easy. Our current grading system in mathematics is counterproductive to learning (students are inhibited from engaging in essential learning activities out of the fear that is naturally induced by typical high-stakes … Read more
I felt like learning more about superconductivity last week, so I spent some time reading from various sources. Not being an expert in the field, I cobbled together what I could find, and I thought I would list some items that might be of use to others who would like to learn about this very … Read more
Update (21 March 2011): A great version of the Gimli glider story is here. In 1983, an Air Canada plane ran out of fuel on a scheduled flight. Running out of fuel is a very unusual situation for a modern airline; the problem here was an error in converting units between the Imperial system and … Read more