On 15/02/10 14:21, Robert Bradshaw wrote:
On Feb 15, 2010, at 5:40 AM, kcrisman wrote:
Although I personally enjoy the *good* examples; honestly, I think it
would be irresponsible to ask someone taking calculus as a pre-
physical-therapy student (which ours are required to, for good
biomechanical reasons) to learn from a definition-theorem book. This
student needs to understand force/time curves, possibly dosing things,
and the concepts of calculus; a physics student needs that but also
tons of practical computation techniques, the math major needs at
least some proofs, the econ major needs marginal cost and
complementary commodities... and then marketing decisions are made to
try to sell one book for *all* these constituencies.
I agree--as much as I like the definition-theorem format too, there is
a definite bias in learning styles in this community ;). In my
experience, math majors, let alone potential graduate students, are a
small minority in Calculus classes (and most of those who would eat up
a more rigorous approach will have probably tested out of first-year
calculus anyways).
Despite that, $200+ 1200 page textbooks are overkill, and once free
alternatives start becoming popular they'll have trouble justifying it.
I just will add that these alternatives can fit different styles and
preferences for different persons, so free books (as in price and
freedom) will find their readers instead of the one size fits all style
of todays math books.
Offray
- Robert
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