Jacob J. Walker's Blog

“You got to drift in the breeze before you set your sails. It’s an occupation where the wind prevails. Before you set your sails drift in the breeze.” – Paul Simon

Many texts about data science (including machine learning, data mining, and predictive analytics) don’t include much about the very first step of the process, which is the step where you come up with what your goal is for your other steps.  In traditional science, this might be called the step of making your hypothesis.

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I ran into two articles this morning about education from the Washington Post that on the surface seem very different, yet truly dovetail into each other.   The first is the fact that education in the United States is not providing the skills to the population that will be needed for the 21st century, even though it is in vogue to say things are “21st Century Skills”.   One only needs to look to the fact that Common Core requires teaching imaginary numbers but never mentions binary to see we have a problem.  The other article was about how we screw up learning in school so often, and how instructional fads that are said to be absolutely true at the time, are often not.  Along the same lines, it is worth considering what has happened when kids have just gotten to use a computer, and how much they learned on their own.

I am a believer in getting “more effect for your effort”, as we only have 24 hours in a day, and no more than about 100 years of consciousness with a contiguous self-identity.   Learning, teaching, and creating are some of the most valuable things we can do to have the possibility that our life’s impact will be more than just dust of this planet.  So I am spending more time in my car listening to books, and less listening to news.  These are some practical tips that I have found using an Android phone as my main learning tool.

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