NavList:

Hi Frank

It was reviewed on nature.org – having an active kindle I downloaded it with ‘1 click’ and at about 0100 – dead of night started reading it.

I am only into the history of ‘man ( woman)  counting’ – but I read daily, with continued bewilderment, how media stories of our continued decline in the education standards of our children and noted this week a university Professor in Mathematics stating in words similar ‘what do you expect when there is a shortage of qualified mathematics teachers and teaching mathematics defaults to the PE teacher who hates maths and feeds this to our children’ and HSC punishes you for taking High Level mathematics.

And the result – 30 -40 years in the making – generations of mathematically illiterate children – YET this country is trying to gear up for taking on the most sophisticated advanced nuclear powered weapon platform on earth – the Virginia Class nuclear powered attack sub – and we 30 -40 years of mathematically illiterate children – WE DID TELL THEM NOT TO DROP MATHEMATICS.

Read ‘The Rickover Effect’ and his book ‘Education  and Freedom’ his passionate appeal in the 50-60s for support for education in science and mathematics as an essential for modern democracy.

When he was tasked to develop the USA nuclear powered Submarine navy he went looking for engineers – the USA educations system had already failed – the theme for his book – it is rare but I have a copy and have read it – an extra-ordinary read

It seems we keep having to re-learn old lessons – or stop dumbing down education so every child feels good about learning.

Here is a book review 1959 [attached image]
Anyways – I digress. A screenshot of the 3 calculators I still have with me [attached image]

• 1^st Left – is my trusty HP 42S I carry with me 100% of the time in my back pack for ALL calculations – it was with me as a navigator on P3B Orions
• 2^nd – I gave to my son for school but he didn’t really use it as the maths teachers were already failing in their understanding of mathematics and no one understood RPN – he gave it back to me recently and it is on my desk in my office – I use it so I don’t have to get my 42S – alas it only has 1 digit display unlike the 42S which has X & Y displayed.
• 3^rd I keep this in my desk but seldom use it – financial HP version – I have developed a complex Amortisation spreadsheet that does all of this very smartly – but it is there

I look for forward to getting into the Empire of the Sum!!

Howard G.

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