On Sun, 03 Nov 1996 09:36:32 -0800, Dale Thorn wrote:

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properties than regular logarithms, but I thought this bit of history would spark some memories in old-timers and give a new perspective for younger people. [snip] The same thing goes on with SATs and especially SAT-IIs. Some higher-end calculators, esp. HPs, have plugin cartridges which automate much of the basic work in chemistry, physics, etc. I never saw anyone who used such things even get asked about it. Do we even need social engineering with people this stupid? Technology has a base, much like a pyramid. When you add enough layers, you can't find very many people who can traverse top to bottom and understand all of what's in between. How true... I consider it a miracle when a student has the quality of consciousness to buck the trend and get themself a quality instrument (such as an HP-48SX/GX), since once they do that, they might be encouraged to explore further.

Were this the way it actually happened, I'd tend to agree. However, the group that bought high-end calculators solely to do things like this was proably about 50-60% of the total. # Chris Adams <adamsc@io-online.com> | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp # <cadams@acucobol.com> | send mail with subject "send PGPKEY" "That's our advantage at Microsoft; we set the standards and we can change them." --- Karen Hargrove, Microsoft (quoted in the Feb 1993 Unix Review editorial)