Gerald Jay Sussman

"Sussman has pioneered the use of computational descriptions to communicate methodological ideas in teaching subjects in Electrical Circuits and in Signals and Systems. Over the past decade Sussman and Wisdom have developed a subject that uses computational techniques to communicate a deeper understanding of advanced Classical Mechanics. Computational algorithms are used to express the methods used in the analysis of dynamical phenomena. Expressing the methods in a computer language forces them to be unambiguous and computationally effective. Students are expected to read our programs and to extend them and to write new ones. The task of formulating a method as a computer-executable program and debugging that program is a powerful exercise in the learning process. Also, once formalized procedurally, a mathematical idea becomes a tool that can be used directly to compute results. Sussman and Wisdom, with Meinhard Mayer, have produced a textbook, "Structure and Interpretation of Classical Mechanics," to capture these ideas."

Taken from MIT.

Next semester I am teaching mechanics. My students are juniors in college, but if they took physics, that was in high school. I want to teach them mechanics.

I've taught mechanics many times. I've made some clarifications for myself doing that. Nevertheless after working as a software engineer at Lucent, I felt that computer programming could be a good addition to my classes. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that Professors Sussman, and Wisdom, have written such a book already, with the Scheme programming language invented at MIT, which can be downloaded for free.

At this moment in my life I am finally understanding what is the role of Information in physics. My notes already have some of my very preliminary ideas.

Thanks to Prof. Sussman I can concentrate on that, which is the topic of my next note.