To the Editor: I disagree with the people who are printing up these absurd "Fuck Maple" T-shirts and I question your biased coverage of them and their infantile complaints. Let's look at what they are saying and how you're reporting it without question. Their first complaint is that Maple is too expensive. First of all, Maple is available at just about every computer lab on campus for free. However, even if you buy it, it's cheaper than most word processing software available for Macintosh computers. The Maple software alone costs $97.25, whereas WordPerfect for Macintosh goes for $110.00 (at the Computer Connection), and MacWrite Pro costs $169.00 (at MacWarehouse). To the math student, Maple is just as useful and indispensable as a word processor is to anybody who has to write (which, I would guess, is everybody at Penn). A call to the bookstore (that could have been made by the DP reporter) reveals that the Math 140 textbook costs $104.00 without Maple and $158.00 with Maple. Even Maple nay-sayers can figure out that that means Maple is only $54.00 with the textbook – certainly a good deal. The textbook, then, is the expensive item, not the software. The other major complaint centers around having to type in all the problems. Please, people, this is 1993, you are adults, you are supposed to be "the best and the brightest" at one of the most prestigious universities on the planet, yet you don't know how to type? If you don't know how, you don't even want to learn? I don't hear too many students complaining that they "have to type in all the sentences" of their English papers. Why haven't I seen angry mobs of students trying to make a buck off of "Fuck WordPerfect" T-shirts? It's because you have already cut your teeth on word processors. Now you're doing the same with Maple. I know it's painful, but think of the problems you'll be able to chew on later! (Wouldn't THAT be a great angle for a DP story?) The larger issue here (and the one that concerns me the most) is that students are reacting so severely against a tool that could make learning math easier for them and could make them that much more competitive in the shrinking job market, if they only gave it a chance. Professional scientists use Maple every day. One math professor told me that he would have given his left arm for something like Maple as recently as 10 years ago. Graduate students in the Math department rave about Maple. In my experience, Maple is better than using a calculator and sketching graphs by hand. It's faster, easier, and more flexible. Plus, the Math Department has gone out of its way to provide documentation and examples to make it easy to learn Maple. There are training sessions, help through the Math Center, and it is used in class by professors who are quite proficient with it, contrary to your one-sided reporting. We should consider ourselves lucky to have Maple and a forward-looking Math Department to support it. I suspect that there is an uglier truth behind this pseudo-protest: some students just don't want to adapt to a changing world. It's not fair! Learning Maple should be as easy as watching Beavis and Butthead, right? If that's the case, I suggest that they let Maple off the hook and go after the real culprit. Who is the real culprit, you ask? I won't tell you, but I'll give you a tip on some T-shirt ideas that could really rake in the cash: "Fuck Math", "Fuck Calculus", "Fuck Isaac Newton", "Fuck College", "Fuck Education", "Fuck Civilization", and so on. The problem isn't with Maple, it's with the saps who want the world to stand still. CHRIS HIESTER College of General Studies
The Daily Pennsylvanian is an independent, student-run newspaper. Please consider making a donation to support the coverage that shapes the University. Your generosity ensures a future of strong journalism at Penn.
DonatePlease note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.
