News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Big Picture of Calculus (2010) [video]. Parent comment

Re:Big Picture of Calculus (2010) [video] by umanwizard on Monday February 13, 2017 @11:16AM (#13636362)
"Calculus" by Tom Apostol has lots and lots of simple physics applications.

I cant think of any obvious applications of calculus to the average non-technical person's daily life. If that's what you mean, you're going to have a bad time, as I think it's a misconception of what math is supposed to be for.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Big Picture of Calculus (2010) [video] by semi-extrinsic on Monday February 13, 2017 @12:28PM (#13637014)
Well, there's plenty of applications that may not be "daily life" but rather "you're likely to encounter this at some point". Take the relation between speed and distance traveled, or the difference between marginal cost and per-unit cost.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Big Picture of Calculus (2010) [video] by umanwizard on Monday February 13, 2017 @06:12PM (#13639740)
Approximately zero people will ever need to answer questions like "if I drive t^2 miles per hour for k minutes, how far did I go?"
[ Parent | on HN ]