Sunday, August 23, 2015

The algebra needed to read about climate change...

This article (at occupy.com), on a lawsuit from a group of young people demanding that we do what it takes to recover from climate change, looks very interesting. One line seemed either wrong or surprising to me, though.

We must immediately commence carbon emissions reductions of 6% each year until the end of the century. Timing is crucial. If we wait until 2020 to begin emissions reductions the annual requirement is 15% per year.
Starting only 5 years earlier, they are saying that we can do 2/5ths as much reducing each year, for 85 years instead of 80, and get the same result. It seems too dramatic. I want to think about how to analyze it. I don't yet know what assumptions I can make.

  • Should I compare total emissions from now until 2100? (I think so.)
  • Should I assume emissions are growing exponentially from now until 2020 in the 2nd scenario? (I think so.)
  • What else would I need to know? (Are there other factors that make this more complicated?)
This seems like a perfect question for pre-calculus. Too bad I'm not teaching it this semester.

I think I got it. I think this assumes that we are currently increasing our carbon emissions at a rate of about 20% a year.  We are not. It's more like a tenth of that - about 2.5%. (Government source here.)

If you want to do some real math, think about what you would do before continuing.

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I figured it like this. I count this year's carbon emissions as 1. If we decrease 6% a year, that means we have 94% of the previous year's emissions. So the total emissions from now until 2100 is
S=1+.94+.94^2+...+.94^84. This simplifies to S = (1-.94^85)/(1-.94). Note that the .94^85 is so close to 0 that we can ignore it. We Get S=1/.06 =  16.666. So the article is saying that for the next 85 years, we can emit 16 times this year's emissions.

If we increase until 2020, we would start with higher emissions, H. 15% decrease per year leaves 85% of the previous year's emissions. Our sum would be
S=H+.85H+.85^2H+...+.85^79H = H(1-.85^79)/(1-.85) = (almost) 1/.15 = 6.666.

16.666 - 6.666 = 10. So somehow we get 10 times this year's emissions within the next 5 years. If our emissions are currently increasing so that our emissions next year is r, then
S = 1 + r + r^2 + ... +r^5 = (1-r^6) / (1-r) = 10. I asked wolframalpha.com to solve  this and got r = 1.2, for a 20% increase per year.

I asked John Golden to check my work. He used a continuous increase model and got close to 9%, mush lower. But still not low enough to match what's happening.

So it seems that either the article has a typo, or my mathematical model is not including everything it should. Humanity seems to be at a tipping point. Can we change our ways of making decisions, from capitalism to something else, in time to save ourselves from our foolishness? I would like everyone to be able to do this sort of math.

Saturday, August 22, 2015

Linear Algebra Question

On Thursday we arrived at Theorem 1 in David Lay's Linear Algebra and Its Applications:
"Uniqueness of the Reduced Echelon Form
Each matrix is row equivalent to one and only one reduced echelon matrix."

The proof is in an appendix, which is a bummer, because this class feels like it could build from first principles nicely up to all its glory. The proof involves material from chapter 4, and I have to fight my way through it. Isn't he worried about being circular?

I was thinking out loud in class. I said (more or less):
If the system is consistent, it has a particular solution set. You can read the solution off from the reduced echelon form, so it can only give you one answer. [In class I wasn't thinking about free variables, and whether those could be different somehow. I was just thinking about problems with one unique solution.] We know it gives the right answer because
we've already shown that elementary row operations create row equivalent matrices, which have the same solution set.

What about an inconsistent system? I'm not sure about that. If you can break his theorem, I'll give you extra credit. 

Well, I just broke his theorem, I think. (I hope none of my students are reading my blog yet.) Given the system

Have I broken his theorem? Should he have said this instead?
"Each matrix representing a consistent system of equations is row equivalent to one and only one reduced echelon matrix."

Friday, August 21, 2015

Random Grouping Cards and Slips

I have just finished my first week of class.

I have finally used Myra Snell's Random Grouping Cards, to put students in groups. I've been wanting to do this for the past year, and finally got over my inertia problem. Research shows that putting students in visibly random groups gets them participating more. (Visibly means they don't wonder if the teacher made it non-random.)

Myra's cards work for a class of 32 students or (a bit) fewer. If you class is bigger or much smaller, you'll need something different. I couldn't figure out an easy way to get mine onto her format. So mine are Random Grouping Slips. I have sets for 16, 23, 32, and 48 students. You cut off the first column, and then slice apart the rows.

I was intrigued that I could not (easily) get 24 student slips. The last one would have put two people together in the last group who had been together before. The way I set it up was based on 16. There was no simple way to make it smaller.

I ended up with classes with 20, 40, and 28 students, so I've made those too now. They're organized a bit differently. I don't like the time it takes to cut them on the paper cutter. Hmm...

Some of the students complain, but I think I am already seeing more of a community forming among the whole class. I'll be watching for ways in which this changes classroom dynamics.

I have also finally begun to implement the Gallery Walk I learned about at the CAP (California Acceleration Project) conference from Myra. I hope to write about that soon.

All three of my classes seem to be going well.

Saturday, August 8, 2015

Links on Saturday (lots for First Day)

First Day 

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