[Edu-sig] re: PyGeo

[Kirby Urner]

> = Art 
  = Kirby

>My sense of where you and I part company in a fundamental way has nothing to
>do with programming, education in general, PyGeo, POV-RAY, or Python.
>
>It has to do with geometry.
>
>You seem intrigued by and devoted to "alternative" geometric concepts.  I
>am essentially a Euclid fundamentalist. When I run the world, we probably
>throw away all the Geoemetry texts and go back to Heath's Euclid. I'm 
>only pissed we have to settle for a translation. Maybe we make ancient 
>Greek a pre-requisite.
>
>ART

You could be right Art.  Although I could write a lot about
this, I'm reluctant to do so on Edu-Sig, as we're no longer
talking about Python per se, nor even CP4E exactly.

I will say that I don't know for sure that anything I'm 
doing contradicts the original Greek implementation.  As 
formalized by later generations, perhaps the discrepancies
build up, but all those Euclidean demos remain relevant 
to my work (at least a couple web sites have implemented 
at least some of his Elements in the form of animated 
step-by-step presentations).

What I will say here (because I think it's relevant) is that
I consider it wasteful to always be sticking to a flat plane
when doing geometry.  In the old days, going spatial was 
more difficult and tedious, and people considered it an
elaboration of the planar constructs -- not necessary to
get into from the point of view of teaching a Euclidean 
mindset.

But my view is that computers and our new graphical tools
free us from the plane, get us into space.  Kids deserve 
a much better, easier on-ramp into spatial geometry than
ever before.  And the Oregon Curriculum Network is about 
supplying such an on-ramp (one of many possible).  

But I wouldn't say that in going from a planar to a spatial
focus that my approach is "anti-Euclidean" in any way. 
Plus I notice PyGeo is thoroughly volumetric in its 
approach.  So our differences (as you seem to detect 
them) must lie elsewhere.  Perhaps that's a thread we 
could pick up on someday on another listserv -- might be 
interesting to teachers with a more specialized interest 
in geometry and the pedagogical debates surrounding that 
subject.

Kirby