Re: LOGO-L> Total Turtle Trip

[mikedoyle@cix.compulink.co.uk (Mike Doyle)]

In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19971027214617.00a3b730@tiac.net>
On Monday 27th at 21:46 Chuck Shavit <CShavit@MagicSquare.com> wrote:

> This last issue is related, I think, to what Mike Doyle was saying.  The
> relation between MCIRCLE and a mathematical circle is somewhat fuzzy.
> Mike's mistake, if I understand him correctly, is that he thought that
> MCIRCLE is the only Logo-ish way to draw circles.  But maybe I missed
> something in what Mike was saying.

I think perhaps you missed the bit from /Turtle Geometry/ and /Mindstorms/ 
that defined Turtle geometry as the geometry of a movement and a turn. To 
my mind (in 1982) this implied that the one impossible construction in 
Turtle geometry is a circle. 

I noticed that all circle procedures in this thread are written with the 
objective of producing a perceptual circle on the screen. The Logo 
instructions in no way define the operation of describing a circle as, say 
a child swinging a cocker (horse chestnut) on a string would. The Logo-ish 
way I prefer is that used in Geomland, a Euclidean geometry microworld, 
where the compass is admitted as a virtual instrument.

The interesting relationship between Turtle geometry and digital 
representation, on the one hand, and Euclidean geometry and analogue 
representation, on the other appears to have been buried by Turtle 
Geometers delight in crafting obscure notation. 

I become increasingly concerned that the influence of mathematicians on 
the development of the use of computers in schools has been unhelpful.

Michael Doyle (aka Micheal O Duill)
37 Bright Street
SKIPTON BD23 1QQ UK
Tel/fax: +44 (0)1756 794601
Email: mikedoyle@cix.co.uk

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