The third list.

TOP TEN
STUPIDEST THINGS
TO ASK OR SAY
IN ECE 340

10. CAN WE LEAVE FIVE MINUTES EARLY?

9. WHY DON'T “FOURIER” AND “LAPLACE” SOUND THE WAY THEY LOOK?

8. ARE THERE GOING TO BE CONVOLUTIONS ON THE FINAL?

7. WHY WON’T YOU READ THE TOP TEN LISTS ALOUD IN CLASS?

6. SO, WHICH HOMEWORK PROBLEMS IS THE GRADER GOING TO LOOK AT? JUST CURIOUS.

5. WE GET TO DROP OUR LOWEST TEST SCORE, RIGHT?

4. CAN WE GET EXTRA CREDIT FOR MAKING TOP TEN LISTS?

3. WHEN WE MISS A PROBLEM WITH IMAGINARY NUMBERS, HOW COME YOU TAKE OFF REAL POINTS?

2. WHAT DO YOU THINK IS MORE FUN, SLIDING THOSE CHALKBOARDS AROUND OR SWIVELING ON THESE SEATS?

1. WHAT'S THIS “e” SYMBOL YOU KEEP WRITING? IT’S NOT IMPORTANT, IS IT?

Postscript
Something like that first question actually got asked. Not in ECE 340 (where e, or Euler’s number, was in the spotlight), but in Math 254, Differential Equations, and the question was “what’s this i symbol you keep writing?”

For those who haven’t taken trigonometry, i means an imaginary number and is defined as the square root of -1. Despite the name, imaginary numbers are quite “real” and useful. Numbers made up of real and imaginary parts are called “complex numbers”, which I imagine is part of an image makeover for the otherwise whimsical-seeming entities.

The questioner, sitting down front, asked his question contemptuously, annoyed, imagining that he had somehow caught the teacher in a bad teaching moment. Little did he know (and I do mean little) the rest of us had been steeped in imaginary and complex numbers for two years—four if you count their first appearance in high school. My friend Yazdi and I watched from the back of the classroom, agog and aghast, while our teacher, apparently committed to the proposition that there is no such thing as a stupid question, basically stopped the class in order to give this guy a personalized digest of the origin and derivation of imaginary numbers.

From twenty years distance I realize that I was perhaps making a lot out of a 15-minute detour. It’s because when you’ve suffered to reach a certain point, you make a point of being certain that others have suffered the same. What was the point of prerequisites if the teacher would give you the Cliffs-notes version on demand?