I've made mistakes in exams, bad mistakes, stupid mistakes, small mistakes, you name it. Every time I made one of those, I'd learn from it and pay more attention the next time. I'm actually a big fan of making mistakes, it causes you to step back and think about why you got it wrong in the first place, and that makes you better at something. Once I get something wrong, the reason why I got it wrong becomes more important than what the correct answer to the particular problem. But now imagine that poor mars lander actually had people in it. It still would've been the same "dumb and innocent" units mistake. But do you think it would've been a serious mistake then? It would still have been just a simple units mistake. You're right that no human is perfect and that humans will always make mistakes. But learning from the mistakes you're going to be more prone to not make the same mistakes again. The saying practice makes perfect comes to mind. Maybe not perfect, no, but closer to it, that is definitely possible. -Mario Quoting Herbert Graf : > On Wed, 2007-06-13 at 11:59 -0700, piclist@mmendes.com wrote: >> > But is punishing a person so severely for a simple mistake like that on >> > an exam, where the student is under immense pressure to perform REALLY a >> > good idea? >> >> Someone else used a good example as to why I think the punishment fits the >> mistake by citing the NASA Mars probe crash. It's the same >> carelessness, lack >> of attention. It was not intentional (at least I believe it was >> not), but the >> carelessness lead to the destruction of millions (if not billions, I don't >> recall the price tag on the mission). > > Really? You've NEVER made an error on an exam? EVERY question was > perfect? > > Come now, you'd can't expect perfection on something as artificial as an > exam. There is nothing in real life that approaches an exam in > "craziness", and to expect people to act perfectly on one is IMHO > unreasonable. > > Do you REALLY think that "nailing" a student for one tiny error is a > good idea, from a society point of view? Don't you believe in "learning > from mistakes"? If every time a person made a small mistake they'd be > hammered into the ground I doubt anybody would be left at the end of the > year. > > The example given of the Mars probe doesn't count. Humans make mistakes. > No matter HOW brutal a teacher is, humans will ALWAYS make mistakes. > It's impossible for humans to be perfect. The example is meaningless > since no matter HOW hard ass teachers are, there will ALWAYS be an > example of a human making a mistake that ends up costing alot of money. > > Mistakes happen. To think that by punishing them with a sledge hammer > will eliminate them is IMHO unrealistic. > > -- > http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive > View/change your membership options at > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist > > ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program. -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist