[Sca-cooks] Re: standard tests

[Barbara Nostrand]

Noble Cousin!

Greetings from Solveig!

>  >Its weird how people good in history and science stink in math and people
>  >good in math stink in history and english. Good thing there wern't that many
>  >mathematicians in the Middle Ages or we all would be screwed >.<

Perhaps my command of the English language is not up to your high
standards, but I do have a BA in philosophy which required a fair
amount of writing. My undergraduate average in philosophy was
higher than my undergraduate average in mathematics. Despite this,
I obtained a Ph.D. in discrete geometry. Also, I probably have
rather more history books than the average history major.

I sincerely doubt that a proliferation of mathematicians would
result in a death of culture. The link between music and
mathematics is so common place that musical mathematicians are
almost a stereotype. Similarly, during the middle ages there were
ample connections between mathematics and the arts. Many prominent
mathematicians were active in other areas.

On a final and possibly heretical note. An odd feature of my
own graduate school experience was that the mathematics department
and the English department were housed in the same building. Quite
often, graduate students from the English department would show up
in the mathematics department seeking help with their assignments
and projects. There was also a psychology professor who regularly
hung out in the mathematics department chatting with our graduate
students. Cross-departmental pollination was not entirely a one-way
street. A few of us in the mathematics department occasionally
attended seminars and symposia in the physics department.

				Your Humble Servant
				Solveig Throndardottir
				Amateur Scholar

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| Barbara Nostrand, Ph.D.         | Solveig Throndardottir, CoM       |
| deMoivre Institute              | Carolingia Statis Mentis Est      |
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