Just the Facts, Ma'am...

Detective Sergeant Joe Friday, portrayed by Jack Webb

Probably the largest gain that I have had over the last week or so has been the discernment between fact and concept.

All insects have six legs.

The earth revolves around the sun.

The area of a circle is

πr squared.

Wait a minute, is the last one a concept or a fact?  Makes you want to stop and think about everything that we have been teaching, eh?

 One of the most important things that I have learned over the last two weeks is to look at the questions that I am asking, and determine whether or not they are investigable or non-investigable.  In the field of robotics, engineering and architecture, I felt that it was hard to come up with non-investigable questions, but that is not the case.  I came to realize that by the end of the courses, the questions might be investigable, or factual, based upon the information which was discerned throughout the class, but at the beginning, they were non-investigable, concept-based questions.

I guess that my big question now is, do I continue in this format, working from concept to fact, or do I work more along the lines of fact from the beginning?

I think that one of the things that I like best about the courses within this program in the diversity of the software and apps that we are exposed to.  So often  in reading the posts of the various classmates, I am introduced to apps that are not mentioned in the curriculum itself.  I absolutely love this, and wish that I had more time to work and explore many of the apps discussed.  Unfortunately, time doesn't stand still for anyone, and being able to explore is not always an option.  I was actually hoping to "Blabberize" Sergeant Joe on this page, and have him saying "Just the fact, Ma'am", but the site has been listed as "overloaded" for the past few days, so a picture will have to do.

I think that is the other thing that we need to look at.  

Though it is wonderful to have access to all of these apps and be able to use them, complete reliance on them is not wise.  Be prepared to do other activities, because technology doesn't always work the way that you want...