I am a young researcher at your own institution. One might think that online courses (such as those offered by edX) will make professors (at least those who teach) obsolete. What role do you see professors playing in the future of education? As someone on that career path, I am particularly interested in your views.
For instance, one could take the perspective of analysis. In the real numbers, given a number such as 1 and some other number x, if |1-x| e for any positive real number e then 1 = x (think about this for awhile, if you haven't before, and you will probably believe it). The point here is that the sequence of numbers.9,.99,.999,.9999 etc gets arbitrarily close to the number 1. So the limit of this sequence.999... = 1. I think that this proof is much more intuitive and less "tricky" (ie. does not rely on algebraic manipulation/slight of hand).
As a gamer I realize that skill comes with time and time is the deciding factor, the test should be based on how long people spend playing, not trying to rank their current ability. Maybe you could take into account what genre of game the person plays most, also. Do it by time spent playing video games vs. academics. The results would really be interesting if it turned out that the more time spent playing, meant the better grades.
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Amusingly: https://science.slashdot.org/story/12/05/23/2240213/mit-creates-superhydrophobic-condiment-bottles#comments
Dear Anant,
I am a young researcher at your own institution. One might think that online courses (such as those offered by edX) will make professors (at least those who teach) obsolete. What role do you see professors playing in the future of education? As someone on that career path, I am particularly interested in your views.
Sincerely,
Nathaniel Stapleton
There is meant to be a "less than" in there: |1-x| is less than e.
For instance, one could take the perspective of analysis. In the real numbers, given a number such as 1 and some other number x, if |1-x| e for any positive real number e then 1 = x (think about this for awhile, if you haven't before, and you will probably believe it). The point here is that the sequence of numbers .9, .99, .999, .9999 etc gets arbitrarily close to the number 1. So the limit of this sequence .999... = 1. I think that this proof is much more intuitive and less "tricky" (ie. does not rely on algebraic manipulation/slight of hand).
As a gamer I realize that skill comes with time and time is the deciding factor, the test should be based on how long people spend playing, not trying to rank their current ability. Maybe you could take into account what genre of game the person plays most, also. Do it by time spent playing video games vs. academics. The results would really be interesting if it turned out that the more time spent playing, meant the better grades.