Problem solving and mathematical knowledge
This event took place on Friday 10 December 2010 at 11:30

Joe Corneli

I will give a brief retrospective on the past year at KMi and talk a little bit about what brought me here in the first place! I will then spend the rest of the time discussing my plan for the next two years. Succinctly, the plan is to build a problem-solving layer over the encyclopedia layer that comprises the central feature of the current PlanetMath.org. Research will proceed by examining the activities of people in this space (e.g. connecting, discussing, working, recording, sharing, learning, etc.) and analysis of these pursuant to creating useful recommendations for learners. I am particularly interested in looking at the ways problem-solving connects with encodings of knowledge in the encyclopedia layer. Comments and criticisms are welcome; and, to this end, please come with an opinion about the following motivating quote: "Outsiders see mathematics as a cold, formal, logical, mechanical, monolithic process of sheer intellection; we argue that insofar as it is successful, mathematics is a social, informal, intuitive, organic, human process, a community project." -- Social Processes and Proofs of Theorems and Programs, by DeMillo, Lipton, and Perlis.