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in reply to Re: Worst blog post ever on teaching programming
in thread Problematic post on teaching programming

What I *really* think all college students should be required to take, that most schools unfortunately do not require, is a course in logic.

When I was an undergrad at RPI, the Symbolic Logic course was grouped with the Philosophy courses, and so it met the humanities credit distribution requirement. Everyone took symbolic logic. :-)

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Re: Worst blog post ever on teaching programming
by jonadab (Parson) on Apr 03, 2006 at 14:42 UTC
    Symbolic logic isn't really what I had in mind. I was thinking a traditional logic course, covering inductive and deductive reasonings, components of an argument (premeses, conclusions, and so forth), common logical fallacies, and the like -- basically the ability to distinguish between valid reasoning and nonsense. Though, symbolic logic also would not go amiss.
[reply]

      I think the subject used to be called "Rhetoric", and it was once taught in college (sometimes even earlier). I agree that some effort should be made to teach people how to reason in a disciplined manner. Without that, much education is merely stuffing people full of facts that they may retain for a lifetime, but which they can't make much use of.

[reply]
      basically the ability to distinguish between valid reasoning and nonsense

      You'd think they'd teach that in grade 1. I weep for the future of mankind.
[reply]

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