Smart Pen Solves Math Problems & More!

[Ivan Seeking]

Among its stunts: Using special paper, you can write words and have the pen pronounce them (never mind that it sometimes butchered the pronunciation of "molecule" and sometimes got it right). Tap the pen against an included North American map, and Fly can bark out names of state capitals or play a few bars from the U.S., Mexican and Canadian national anthems. Or you can write various commands (for example, "tell me a joke") and have the pen oblige.

Other neat tricks: You can sketch a calculator and use the pen to solve basic math problems. [continued]

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/edwardbaig/2005-11-30-fly-pentop_x.htm

What really caught my eye was a commercial where the pen instructs a kid on how to proceed with an algebra problem.

 

[radou]

There'll soon be pens which will be able to serve as one's personal psychiatrist. Or perhaps, they'll be able to cook dinner and vacuum clean. Or, you know, simply, do the talking. For example, I like a girl and I'm too stressed out to approach her and ask her out. So, I have the pen to do it for me. Or, a pen which could attend a job interview instead of you. That'd be great.

 

[theCandyman]

The perfect Christmas gift for that nerd on your list, right?

 

[dontdisturbmycircles]

lol, I have a feeling that I would exhaust myself writing with it.

 

[Danger]

Ivan, although I thought for a couple of years that you're older than me, I now know that I have a couple of years on you. Still, we're of the same basic generation.
When I was in grade 12, the first 4-banger (as we called them) calculators came out. Add, subtract, multiply and divide. No memory, and no higher functions. They cost about $600. If you were caught with one on school property, even if it was in a locker or even in the glovebox of your car in the parking lot, your were expelled on the spot.
About 15 years ago, the ex-from-hell's pre-teen son informed her that he had to have a graphing calculator for his return to school. What the hell is this world coming to?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

What the hell is this world coming to?

Something wonderful
- Dave Bowman

I think it nearly impossible to overstate the significance of the age. The coming of the information age, combined with other emerging technologies, is one of the epic events in history. While we face many new challanges, the opportunities to change the human condition fundamentally are nothing less than staggering. So I don't see things like this as a negative overall, but it is hard to even imagine what education will be like in 100 years.

Btw, I think you have more like twenty or thirty years on me.

 

[Danger]

I think you have more like twenty or thirty years on me.

and ********!.

The only problem that I have with the technology age is that if technology somehow fails (maybe a global EMP that wipes out anything electronic), will people raised that way be able to survive? I mean, I'm no scientist by any means, but I know how to start a fire by rubbing two Boy Scouts together. I can add and subtract fine on paper or even to some extent in my head. Never got the division thing, but I can multiply like a rabbit (and will if given the chance). I have no sense of time or distance or direction, buy I know how to magnitize a piece of steel to make a compass. It's that dependence upon electronics that worries me.

edit: Those asterisks at the top were supposed to read 'bull$hit'.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

There'll soon be pens which will be able to serve as one's personal psychiatrist. Or perhaps, they'll be able to cook dinner and vacuum clean. Or, you know, simply, do the talking. For example, I like a girl and I'm too stressed out to approach her and ask her out. So, I have the pen to do it for me. Or, a pen which could attend a job interview instead of you. That'd be great.

But can it turn into a nine year old hindu boy and get rid of your wife?

 

[Sorry!]

Lol these pens are kind of old cool though I was thinking of getting one a few years ago to mess around with.

@Danger
At my school at least you're not allowed to use graphing calculators for tests/exams unless there was a graphing calculator section in which case you got that paper first and the teacher supplied you wtih a graphing calculator and you finished that paper and handed it in with the calculator before you got the rest of the test/exam.

As well I don't think that people learning how to allow technology to help them is bad in anyway. Becoming dependent on it is obviously completely different but that's their fault for not learning it themselves. Most people who become dependent on using say calculators for anything normally aren't successful anyways. My girlfriend is case and point she used the calculator for everything and while I was tutoring her she couldn't even do simple addition/subtraction/division/multiplication without the help of a calculator. Sad but true. (hopefully she doesn't read this

I had a scientific calculator that cost me I think around 50$... Throughout school I only ever used it to make simple calculations faster like division because that's all I knew it could do. As I advanced through math though I started messing around with my calculator more and figured out some interesting things I don't think even the teachers know the calculators are useful for. For instance they can solve for any polynomial to any degree... That became EXTREMELY useful for tests in grade 12 calculus. On a test I would do the work by hand (because you have to show your work or you get say 1/8) Then I would check my final answer by comparing to what the calculator got. Needless to say on all those questions I got perfect. :)

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

A pen that's smarter than I am. Big deal. My wife says a brick is smarter than I am.

 

[Moonbear]

Most people who become dependent on using say calculators for anything normally aren't successful anyways. My girlfriend is case and point she used the calculator for everything and while I was tutoring her she couldn't even do simple addition/subtraction/division/multiplication without the help of a calculator. Sad but true. (hopefully she doesn't read this

Ooh, how much are you going to pay me NOT to keep quoting this until your girlfriend sees it? I think the sisterhood's chocolate stockpiles might be getting a little low.

 

[rootX]

As well I don't think that people learning how to allow technology to help them is bad in anyway. Becoming dependent on it is obviously completely different but that's their fault for not learning it themselves. Most people who become dependent on using say calculators for anything normally aren't successful anyways. My girlfriend is case and point she used the calculator for everything and while I was tutoring her she couldn't even do simple addition/subtraction/division/multiplication without the help of a calculator. Sad but true. (hopefully she doesn't read this

I forgot what's 8x7 when I was writing my Calc III exam

I can use my Casio fx 991 MS at lighting speed and I have used every function it it :). I badly suck at using other models - can take me some time to do even simple calculations because I am so used to mine.

 

[mgb_phys]

I've seen a lot of 'older' managers doing calculations on a calculator and typing the answer into a spreadsheet - I suppose it's what your used to.
I still reach for the calculator when I'm in front of a computer that has bc built into the command line.

 

[rootX]

I've seen a lot of 'older' managers doing calculations on a calculator and typing the answer into a spreadsheet - I suppose it's what your used to.

I also do that when formula is too complicated and it takes less time.