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Saturday, April 21st, 2018
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9:38 pm - test
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| Friday, October 21st, 2016
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4:29 pm - Ask/Tell Me Anything; Screened Edition: Oct 2016
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Linked from Facebook because this supports anonymous and sceened replies.
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(comment on this)
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| Wednesday, June 26th, 2013
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2:20 pm - Thoughts on the filibuster
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On the surface, a filibuster seems like heavy-handed obstructionism. On the other, we just saw it used to excellent effect last night to block an anti-abortion bill in Texas, despite numerous and repeated shenanigans. Many of my dear friends see this as an exception to an otherwise cumbersome and deplorable tactic.
However. The filibuster is actually an excellent mechanism of regulation on a legislative body. In general, a simple majority is needed to pass legislation, while a 2/3 majority is required to stop a filibuster. And a filibuster is really only useful at the end of a Senate session. If time is running out on a bill that only needs a simple majority to pass, we're likely talking about a highly contested issue which has come down to the wire. Something that contested should maybe not be pushed through with a simple majority? Just a thought.
The filibuster really is in keeping with our whole system of checks and balances. Think about it. The president (or governer) can't make laws, but they can veto them. The Supreme Court (and lesser courts up to that point) can't make laws, but can rule them unconstitutional. The legislature can overcome a veto with a 2/3 majority, but the SCOTUS is an even higher bar.
We have one branch that makes laws and two branches that kills them. The filibuster is one way to abort a law before it even starts. To me, that seems to be in keeping with the entire checks and balances principle,
Thoughts?
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(12 comments | comment on this)
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| Monday, January 30th, 2012
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11:19 am - Math "puzzles" for 12 year olds
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Generally, when I'm busy, I'll let the calls go to voicemail and call back later. But several calls in a row usually means important, so I answered. My mom called me several times last night during game, so I ducked out to find out what was wrong.
Well, it wasn't an emergency. My niece, Hayley, is doing poorly in math class, but apparently the whole class is failing and my mom is not at all impressed with this particular teacher.
The kids have been given "development" work, which basically means a chance to catch up by doing more and harder problems. They were having trouble with a problem and called me to get help with a solution.
Arrange the digits 1-9 (use each one once) in the following equation:
_/_*_+_*_*_/_+_*_ = 100
Order of operations matter.
I couldn't figure out how to do it mathematically, so I made an excel sheet and brute forced it. I got a solution after approximately 880 guesses iterations in batches of 80 (just the way I set up the sheet).
Afterwards, I looked it up online, and found the problem, with solutions. There are 362,880 possible number arrangements, of which 192 are correct. These were discovered with computer programs and brute force.
Can any math people out there think of a reasonable method for an average 12 year old to find a solution to this problem other than sheer luck or brute force iteration?
This entry was originally posted at http://shogunhb.dreamwidth.org/426222.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
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(17 comments | comment on this)
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