telegraph

That all depends on what one is actually looking to find in an applicant. If the goal of the question is to actually determine if the interviewee has the ability to research a problem, think it through, and implement the solution, then the "homework" approach is definitely superior.

However, if the thrust of the question is to see the applicant think on his/her feet and possibly apply some knowledge from a college class on algorithms (I never covered a problem in this depth in my undergrad comp sci education, but it's definitely standard to discuss computing order statistics), presenting it in the interview is best. The idea of the solution as presented here could easily be sketched out in the interview, and a skilled interviewer could lead the applicant through fleshing out some details if that was so desired.

That said, I think the latter is more often the goal of a final round interview.

For the same reason that all you can eat buffets have small plates.

May I ask why? How does one monetize URL shortening, anyway?

Fails to mention (to me) the most interesting aspect of this kind of work: the complexity and scale of these machines is such that although we may not develop more efficient algorithms for intractable problems in the traditional sense, they may become tractable when computed with DNA.

Yes, a fact I didn't realize until the section on Goldman Sachs referred to the more favorable levels of risk carried by Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns.

"Since texting is usually a binary activity (the texter sends a text for every text they receive) we can guess that Echo writes about 7,000 text messages per month"

A huge oversimplification and probably inaccurate. Especially since most phones made in the past few years have the capability to send a text to multiple recipients, I highly doubt that Echo is typing as many texts as she receives -- both because she's more likely to get mass texts, and because she may herself be sending mass texts (which are charged as multiple texts, but are only typed once). I haven't been a teenager recently, but I also suspect that there is a lot more one sided texting than you'd expect (especially directed at pretty, popular girls).

I think you're overlooking the real thrust of the situation. Wiles' proof was relatively lengthy and involved, but it can be examined and studied by humans in an extremely reasonable amount of time. It only took three days for Wiles to present his original proof. There aren't many people in the world who can understand it, and there are fewer who are knowledgeable enough to confirm its validity, but they exist.

Conversely, the proof described in the NYTimes article is of such length that no single mathematician could confirm its validity -- rather than deducing the non-existence of the object in question by a logical argument, it examined a huge number of possible cases. In that respect, it is far more similar to the proof of the four color map theorem. The issue is not so much whether or not we trust the computer's result, but moreso what it means for mathematics to proceed with results that we do not, in a traditional sense, understand.

It's a clever idea, but as someone who has worked for (and listed as references) supervisors who were extremely flaky, extremely busy, or both, I would never want to judge someone based solely on whether or not their references promptly return a call.

"That might have been the end of it, had the files not, as digital files will, leaked onto the Internet."

This makes it sound like the tubes were leaky that day and because the files were "digital," they just spread out over the Internet like an oil slick. Um, no. Files do not spread simply by virtue of being on a computer.

Thanks, this I understand.

I'm embarrassed to say that I have a degree in math but don't really follow the given proof. Can anyone explain it?

I'm having trouble finding the source (it was in the NYTimes a few months ago), but China has also undertaken a pretty sizable PR campaign encouraging people to have daughters to try and address the ridiculously skewed gender ratios, especially in rural areas (sometimes as high as 2:1 for males).

I think late night phone calls are a lot more palatable now than they were in the 90s, when phone calls for many people meant loud noises in rooms all over ones home instead of a subtle vibration in ones pocket.

I don't have too much big picture advice given that I'm roughly your age and also somewhat disoriented, but with regards to learning your math: most if not all schools will allow you to take a math placement test to determine where you need to begin in the curriculum. I completely agree with you that taking 3 semesters (a year, a year and a half?) just to get up to speed would be silly, especially if you do in fact have an aptitude for math.

If you've never taken calculus it would probably serve you well to take it in an actual classroom (possibly at night while working?), but trig can easily be self taught from a book. If you need a little extra help, contact the math department of a local university and ask if they have a list of students who are available for tutoring. It would be a small cost to meet with someone once or twice a week to stay on track with your self study, compared to an actual college class.

Re: my experience with math instructors, you're probably right. I do think that there's a certain sort of base level of application information that should be imparted with any given mathematical topic (for instance, that calculus is about change! Wow, I'm sorry you had such awful teachers), I just think that focus on applications is a method that's been tried already and just hasn't seemed to improve math education enough.

"I already have plenty of things to read/do when my mind does need a wonder in the evening/weekend" -- for many people, especially those in their 20s who came of age using Facebook, Myspace, AIM, etc, one of those things we do to occupy our time is use the Internet to keep up with friends who we, for whatever reason, can't just call on the phone or hang out with in person. Recent college grads especially suddenly find that their once close friends are scattered across the globe; Twitter lets them maintain a sense of nearness.

To me, that's the appeal. You don't have to be unemployed to have 10 minutes a day in which to keep up, particularly when you weigh that 10 minutes spent reading Twitter against the amount of time it would take to maintain individual correspondences.

I have to respectfully disagree with you. It's true that there is a large group of kids who would be better served if their teachers focused more on applications; however, I think that there's an equally large (if not bigger) group of students for whom learning about applications is not helpful. When I was in public school, my teachers always made an effort to highlight how the math we were learning could be applied to real world problem -- the end result was that often the struggling students would say "You use this to build rocket ships? Well I'm NEVER going to do that... I give up."

The most important thing we can do is change our attitude. It's hard to develop an interest in something that you find difficult when you're receiving mixed messages from all of the adults in your life; when adults will demand you get better grades all while telling you it's okay because "math is for nerds" or "not everyone can do math."

I did well (good grades, but it's not like I was Terence Tao or anything) in math in school, and my teachers in other subjects, my coaches, my friends' parents, etc, acted like I was a freak because of it. You can't give a high five with one hand while you're pointing and laughing with the other. This is the attitude that must change before we can raise a generation who take pride in developing math skills.

This was somewhat buried in the article, and it deserves repetition:

"In many countries, math has long been recognized as a tough subject that can be mastered through hard work, said Tom Loveless, a scholar at the Brookings Institution who analyzes international math test results and cultural differences. Efforts to make math more fun or dress up textbooks are not the answer, he said."

It's absolutely shocking to me how many educators I've encountered (even and especially at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels) who dismiss a lack of basic mathematical proficiency by saying "Well, I was never good at math either!" If this article is an accurate representation of where American math education is headed, then for once I might feel optimistic about it.

Gearing the site towards women is all well and good, but I can tell you right now that your suggestion of using "she" and "her" on the front page will offend. If you want to cater to women, do it by changing your aesthetic and emphasizing the women's clothing/accessories/etc shopping options your site offers -- NOT by assuming that the user is a woman.

As a student of applied mathematics I pretty much agree with the gist of this post, although I'm not entirely sure what it means to "understand the math" of a field if you don't understand the concepts (or, to be unaware of the math if you do understand the concepts).

I think the real key, rather than seeing equations and having them explained to you, is to learn how to read an equation so it teaches or illuminates a concept instead of mystifies. There are lots of simple tricks to this that can be immensely helpful, and most of us already know them: recognizing that a formula is monotonic on its domain, for example, tells you about the relationship of the variables involved, and therefore the mechanics of whatever real world quantities are being described.

Very, very interesting. My first concern when I saw this site was concerning no-shows and late arrivals -- I know many doctor's offices are forced to double book appointments and therefore run extremely late, simply to maintain profitability in the face of lateness and no-shows. Have the hospitals had any issue with late arrivals throwing off the schedule? I'd imagine that if, after paying $24.99 for this service, a patient is still seen late, he or she would be rather (rightly) peeved.

Is this really not satire? "Are introverts arrogant? Hardly. I suppose this common misconception has to do with our being more intelligent, more reflective, more independent, more level-headed, more refined, and more sensitive than extroverts."

You can easily model something like this with regular old ordinary differential equations in Mathematica or MATLAB. The hard part would be gathering the data to design realistic equations.