Prof Strang - Highlights of Calculus

1 - The Big Picture

Calculus is about change. One function tells how quickly another function is changing. Professor Strang shows how calculus applies to ordinary life situations, such as:

• driving a car
• climbing a mountain
• growing to full adult height

2 - Derivatives

Calculus finds the relationship between the distance traveled and the speed — easy for constant speed, not so easy for changing speed. Professor Strang is finding the "rate of change" and the "slope of a curve" and the "derivative of a function

3 - Max & Min & The 2nd Derivative

At the top and bottom of a curve (Max and Min), the slope is zero. The "second derivative" shows whether the curve is bending down or up. Here is a real-world example of a minimum problem:
What route from home to work takes the shortest time?

4 - The Exponential Function

Professor Strang explains how the "magic number e" connects to ordinary things like the interest on a bank account. The graph of
y = e^x
has the special property that its slope equals its height (it goes up "exponentially fast"!). This is the great function of calculus.

5 - Integrals

The second half of calculus looks for the distance traveled even when the speed is changing. Finding this "integral" is the opposite of finding the derivative. Professor Strang explains how the integral adds up little pieces to recover the total distance.
I know the speed at each moment of my trip, so how far did I go?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Squeeze Theorem - "2 policeman & a drunk"

In calculus, the squeeze theorem (known also as the pinching theorem, the sandwich theorem, the sandwich rule and sometimes the squeeze lemma) is a theorem regarding the limit of a function. The squeeze theorem is a technical result that is very important in proofs in calculus and mathematical analysis. It is typically used to confirm the limit of a function via comparison with two other functions whose limits are known or easily computed. It was first used geometrically by the mathematicians Archimedes and Eudoxus in an effort to compute π, and was formulated in modern terms by Gauss. In Italy, Russia and France, the squeeze theorem is also known as the two carabinieri theorem, two militsioner theorem, two gendarmes theorem, or two policemen and a drunk theorem. The story is that if two policemen are escorting a drunk prisoner between them, and both officers go to a cell, then (regardless of the path taken, and the fact that the prisoner may be wobbling about between the policemen) t...
Read more

Surreal Numbers

Image
In mathematics , the surreal number system is a totally ordered class containing the real numbers as well as infinite and infinitesimal numbers , respectively larger or smaller in absolute value than any positive real number. The surreals share many properties with the reals, including the usual arithmetic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division); as such, they form an ordered field . [a] If formulated in Von Neumann–Bernays–Gödel set theory , the surreal numbers are the largest possible ordered field; all other ordered fields, such as the rationals, the reals, the rational functions , the Levi-Civita field , the superreal numbers , and the hyperreal numbers , can be realized as subfields of the surreals. [1] It has also been shown (in Von Neumann–Bernays–Gödel set theory ) that the maximal class hyperreal field is isomorphic to the maximal class surreal field; in theories without the axiom of global choice , this need not be the case, and in such the...
Read more