Episode 135: School Fears
Virginia starts a new semester of PhD courses and worries that she’s in over her head. Nick reminisces about his college days and what it takes to make a good grade in a hard class.
Episode 120: NerdAbsurd’s Unscientific Survey
Virginia and Nick talk about listener responses to a short, unscientific survey about consumer purchasing habits.
Episode 98: Common Core
The crew discusses the backlash surrounding “common core,” which is a new technique for teaching math.
Episode 87: Lifting the Skirt of Innovation
Nick wonders what will happen when 3D printing becomes more mainstream, and Leland and Virginia talk about the economics of future innovations. Virginia talks about learning calculus, and Leland talks about when he found out that the military wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
Are Americans really that bad at math?
There’s an article out today in Discover magazine that blames the financial crisis on bad basic math skills. Apparently people who don’t understand arithmetic don’t have good luck when it comes to paying off their mortgage. Here’s the most interesting part: Interestingly, participants with higher IQs were as likely to fall behind on payments as those with lower IQs, but were more likely to avert actual foreclosure, suggesting greater cognitive abilities may Read More...
Math can be physically painful
A new study proves that math can be about as comfortable as touching a hot stove: The fMRI scans showed the higher a person’s math anxiety, the more anticipation of math activated the posterior insula, an inner brain region associated with registering direct threats to the body and experiencing pain. But interestingly, there was no pain response when the people were actually doing the problems. Does this mean that to Read More...