Mental Models
Course Goals
The goals of the course are to
- provide you with an understanding of computing within the context of the Internet and the World Wide Web (aka, Web).
- empower you with Web knowledge and capabilities that will enhance any career
The Professor
The professor introduced himself, gave way to many clues about his age, and professed that he still enjoys computer science after beginning a study of it 47 years ago before it was even known what computer science was.
Mental Models
The concept of a mental model was introduced. In essence, a mental model is a conceptualization we have in our minds, whether we consciously think about it or not, of some aspect of the world in which we live. For example, we have a mental model of a car, how it works, and how it can be driven. Because cars are built according to certain standards, we have little trouble driving a different car than the one we are used to.
To illustrate the concept of a mental model, a riddle was presented:
A photographer sets out all bundled up one bright, sunny day to take a stroll with her camera. As she enjoys her walk, taking pictures along the way, she purposefully walks due south one kilometer, then due east one kilometer, then due north 1 kilometer. At that moment the hair on the back of her head stands up and she gasps as she becomes acutely aware of two things simultaneously. She is right back where she started from. And there is a bear in her face.
What color is the bear?
After some thought, various students in the class began to come up with correct answer: white.
Resolving this riddle required that one first realize something about geography that was learned back in middle school, or even grade school. The earth is a sphere, and there is a place on the earth we refer to as the magnetic north pole. That is, if one is using a compass to head north, one will be walking towards the north pole. If one starts walking south at the north pole, then east, and then north the same distance that one walked south, one will wind up at the north pole again. Nowhere else on earth can that happen.
So, the photographer must have started out at the north pole, which is why she was all bundled up.
Second, one must have remembered something about animal life at the north pole, remembering that the only bears there are polar bears, and polar bears are white.
We aren't often even aware that we have mental models that help us cope with life, but we do. To learn any subject well, we must develop a mental model of that subject that is functionally correct for our needs.
In this class, we plan to present you with a number of mental models, including models of computer, program (aka application, or app), network, Internet, and Web.