Brilliant Tutorials in Mathematics and Computer Programming

The name is the attractor. I certainly want to be brilliant, if only in my own estimation though not the world’s. About 272 days ago, we both signed and paid $161.88 each. She is still mad at me because she paid for something that does not work. I pointed out that they say that they are hiring and proofreading high school math is exactly her kind of job. So, that ball is in her court. I still work the problems, even when the problems have problems. 

I usually work at night and sometimes I have to skip one (even two) sessions, but I earn battery charges that carry me over. 

So far, I have completed series in elementary algebra, geometry, and calculus in addition to Probability & Chance, Functions, and Vectors, and large sections of logic, data analysis, and some others. A few, I began and chose not to pursue. The lessons on Digital Circuits and Circuits are waiting for me to make time to haul out the breadboarding kits. (I want to see their answers.) 

The reviews are nice exercises at bedtime. I do most of the work in my head. Some got complicated and required pen and paper and some of those are long tutorials, which, if I quit, I lose my place and have to start over. (About the third pass, I have memorized the first several answers.) It’s bedtime reading. I do enjoy the learning.

Find sin(a+b). 

I worked this through over three nights and was able to conceptually integrate the lesson and the proof of the formula. 

The Pythagorean Theorem has over 300 published proofs (one of the them by Pres. James Garfield). The proof in Euclid’s Elements is one of the most complex and demanding and least intuitively obvious presentations of this well known truth. So, too, with this demonstration of the measure of the sines of two adjacent angles. Nonetheless, after several repetitions, I found it elegant.

But not everything works that well. I ran into bugs in their tutorials for polar coordinates and for modulo arithmetic. As I told Laurel when she discovered other errors, all that is required is to document everything with screenshots, write out a descriptive narrative to show your work, and send it to them. 

51 mod 3 = 0 and also 51 mod 17 = 0.
And 51 mod 2 = 1.
But not here.

The Polar Coordinates maths are inverted.

The iPhone can be a barrier. I stopped working in Python, computer science, and AI because it is easier on the keyboard and I seldom sit here before going to sleep. So, I do what I can in bed and let the rest slide until I can have some daytime hours free for fun and games. I did finish the packet on Algorithmic Thinking. 

For another overview, see Wikipedia here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brilliant_(website)

More pros and cons on Quora here https://www.quora.com/What-is-your-review-of-Brilliant-org

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

Elisha S. Loomis and the Pythagorean Proposition 

How the Martians Discovered Algebra 

The Man Who Loved Only Numbers 

G. H. Hardy’s ‘Apology’ 

Birth of a Theorem by Cédric Villani 

A Simple Truth 

Grigory Perelman’s Perfect Rigor by by Masha Gessen