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Vid,

If you are a student, I know you're very busy, but wow, do I have a book for you! It's called "Tour of the Calculus" by David Berlinski. For some odd reason, I felt compelled to buy this a few months ago. It is fantastic. First and foremost, he does an incredible job with all the fundamentals. Not just the calculus itself, but the irrational numbers, functions, limits, etc. What really tops it off is his gift for writing. Granted, it's not a textbook, but I sure never saw writing like that in engineering school. The last hundred pages or so tie the differential and integral calculus together in a way I never fully realized before. The real fundamental difference between the definite and indefinite integral - unbelievable! Look for my upcoming review of this book, soon to be on Amazon.com, if they'll have me. BTW, I got it in paperback for $14 (US).

Rick

Rick,

Sounds like a good book. I remember my college calculus text book took a trip up against a wall precisely because of the opaque manner in which it was written. When I finally figured out what it was trying to say I ended up shouting "WHY DIDN'T YOU JUST SAY THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE". The book you are suggesting sounds like something that has been needed for a long time.

Thanks for the recommendation! It sounds like a good read. The thing is I actually like math, but the pace of this course is just too fast for me to absord everything. The textbook assumes you're already a math genius so its extremely difficult to get much out of it. I'm sure if you know that stuff already you can say 'a ha, that's how that works', but as it is I just end up being confused. At least this term will be over in a few weeks.

The astronomer Kepler was looking for the Music of the Spheres believing that the planet orbits actually generated music. In the process he serendipidously discovered that the orbits were eleptical rather than circular. The Greeks included musical events as part of the olympics. That things that make you good at math are the same that make you good at music. Hard work and study.