eScience workshop • december 2008 rosalind reid executive director harvard initiative in innovative computing can the next generation of scientists become “computational thinkers”?
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Transcript eScience workshop • december 2008 rosalind reid executive director harvard initiative in innovative computing can the next generation of scientists become “computational thinkers”?
eScience workshop • december 2008
rosalind reid
executive director
harvard initiative in innovative computing
can the next generation of
scientists become
“computational thinkers”?
Fact 1: Computation will be at the core of all
science within the next decade.
Fact 2: Today’s undergraduates are
tomorrow’s research scientists.
Fact 3: Computational thinking generally is
not integrated into undergraduate science
curricula at Harvard.
Is this a problem?
We asked the faculty. (At Harvard, always
ask the faculty.)
narrative responses to an
informal online survey* of
Harvard science faculty on
“computational thinking”
* conducted June 2008
modest hypothesis: computational thinking (as
defined by Jeannette M. Wing*) can be a
unifying theme for catalyzing curriculum
innovation to improve the preparation of
tomorrow’s scientists.
*of Carnegie Mellon University, now in charge of Computer and Information
Sciences and Engineering (CISE) at NSF
Wing’s examples of
computational thinking in
science*
“machine learning has revolutionized
statistics”
“algorithms and data structures,
computational abstractions and
methods will inform biology”
*Microsoft Faculty Summit, Hangzhou, China, October 31, 2005
notes on these data
quantitative data were collected, but the survey was
informal and unscientific
faculty from several departments took the time to offer
thoughtful comments
respondents self-labeled their fields of research
special thanks to Lynn Stein for her help, to Microsoft
Research for funding, and to Rob Lue for his continuing work
to organize conversation among science faculty on these
questions
and thanks to the EECS faculty for an open and supportive
discussion of co-teaching possibilities
q1: We are interested in how
computation has or has not transformed
research in your field.
theoretical mechanics/earth science: “People with
[deep, fundamental understanding of ... science and math]
are able to do marvelous things with modern computation.”
climate: “Computation is a matter of necessity... as realscale experiments are not possible.”
earth science: “Numerical solution of large-scale
problems...crystal structures, high-pressure phases.”
language/cognition: “More precise and rigorous
formulation and testing of theories... large-scale databases
can be analyzed for patterns of human behavior.”
q1: We are interested in how
computation has or has not transformed
research in your field.
cosmology(n=2): [Computation is] “the engine of progress
in our field.” “High-end computation has become both
necessary and critical for data analysis”
geophysics: “My group.... is doing science that other
groups can’t because we have embraced a computational
approach... computational geometry and [GUIs] enable us
to build and run more realistic models.”
materials/surfaces: “Computation makes it possible to
‘see’ molecular detail.”
astrophysics: “Totally transformed.”
q1: We are interested in how
computation has or has not transformed
research in your field.
paleobiology: “Forward modeling, simulation of complex
systems that cannot be addressed analytically, solutions to
NP-complete problems such as DNA sequence
alignment....”
nanotechnology: “Computerized data acquisition; data
analysis; graphic presentation... of data; simulations of
experiments; fundamental understanding of electrons inside
small structures....”
evolutionary biology: “analyses of large data sets.”
evolutionary developmental biology: “As more and
more genomic sequence data becomes available,
computational methods are necessary to deal with the
data.”
q1: We are interested in how
computation has or has not transformed
research in your field.
paleobiology: “Forward modeling, simulation of complex
systems that cannot be addressed analytically, solutions to
NP-complete problems such as DNA sequence
alignment....”
nanotechnology: “Computerized data acquisition; data
analysis; graphic presentation... of data; simulations of
experiments; fundamental understanding of electrons inside
small structures....”
evolutionary biology: “analyses of large data sets.”
evolutionary developmental biology: “As more and
more genomic sequence data becomes available,
computational methods are necessary to deal with the
data.”
q1: We are interested in how
computation has or has not transformed
research in your field.
exoplanets: “The discovery of exoplanets was enabled by
sensitive optical detectors and by the ability to undertake
massive modeling efforts... and identify best models over a
large parameter space.”
q2: What types of computational thinking
do you expect to become important to
scientific investigation in the coming decade?
theoretical mechanics/earth science: “...intelligent
algorithms and a deep understanding of aspects of the physics
that cannot be represented accurately due to limitations on
computer resources.”
climate: “...how to reduce and abstract a real-world problem
into a computationally solvable problem... and how to map the
results back to the real-world problem.”
earth science: “...numerical solution of problems, use of tools
such as MATLAB and Mathematica...”
language/cognition: “Intelligent searching and parsing of
language databases.”
q2: What types of computational thinking
do you expect to become important to
scientific investigation in the coming decade?
theoretical mechanics/earth science: “...intelligent
algorithms and a deep understanding of aspects of the physics
that cannot be represented accurately due to limitations on
computer resources.”
climate: “...how to reduce and abstract a real-world problem
into a computationally solvable problem... and how to map the
results back to the real-world problem.”
earth science: “...numerical solution of problems, use of
tools such as MATLAB and Mathematica...”
language/cognition: “Intelligent searching and parsing of
language databases.”
q2: What types of computational thinking
do you expect to become important to
scientific investigation in the coming decade?
cosmology (n=2): “... ability to exploit large databases...
write, debug and run programs. Proficiency with a scripting
language. “The ability to conceptualize (and visualize) large
data sets.”
geophysics: “General procedural programming... models and
data visualization... ”
materials/surfaces: “ simulations of complex systems...
solving mathematically intractable problems....manipulating
datasets... capturing time-dependent phenomena.”
evo-devo biology: “the ability to compare many genomes at
once”
q2: What types of computational thinking
do you expect to become important to
scientific investigation in the coming decade?
cosmology (n=2): “... ability to exploit large databases...
write, debug and run programs. Proficiency with a scripting
language. “The ability to conceptualize (and visualize) large
data sets.”
geophysics: “General procedural programming... models and
data visualization... ”
materials/surfaces: “ simulations of complex systems...
solving mathematically intractable problems....manipulating
datasets... capturing time-dependent phenomena.”
evo-devo biology: “the ability to compare many genomes at
once”
q2: What types of computational thinking
do you expect to become important to
scientific investigation in the coming decade?
exoplanets: “novel analyses... of temporal variability surveys
and [categorization of] the variability in these large data sets.”
paleobiology: “...a wealth of more complex, easy-to-use
packages that can handle Bayesian analyses...”
nanotechnology: “..techniques...to handle many [processors]
at once.”
evo-devo biology: “...analyses of large data sets... smart
systems that bring together relevant data from disparate
sources.”
q3: What computational skills and abilities
would allow today’s undergraduates to
tackle tough problems in your field 10 or 20
years from now?
geophysics: “...general programming skills are the key
that allow tomorrow’s researchers to create their own tools...
and think differently.”
materials/surfaces: “...both applied math and skill in
numerical simulations and manipulations...”
astrophysics: “ability to use whatever programs are
standard [and] be able to modify them.”
cosmology “...what is becoming harder and harder is to
get students to understand the very basics of how
astronomical data is collected.”
q3: What computational skills and abilities
would allow today’s undergraduates to
tackle tough problems in your field 10 or 20
years from now?
geophysics: “...general programming skills are the key
that allow tomorrow’s researchers to create their own tools...
and think differently.”
materials/surfaces: “...both applied math and skill in
numerical simulations and manipulations...”
astrophysics: “ability to use whatever programs are
standard [and] be able to modify them.”
cosmology “...what is becoming harder and harder is to
get students to understand the very basics of how
astronomical data is collected.”
q3: What computational skills and abilities
would allow today’s undergraduates to
tackle tough problems in your field 10 or 20
years from now?
evo-devo biology: “statistical analysis, programming,
large-dataset management.”
paleobiology: “the big problems, the importance of first
principles”
nanostructures: “pattern recognition in the most general
sense”
evolutionary biology “... familiarity with... ‘informatics’
approaches”
miscellaneous comments
“Programming seems here to stay.” geophysics
“The larger problem is eliminating innumeracy among
Harvard undergrads. I routinely have students in my core
class that are marginally able, or unable, to deal with
quantitative material.” earth science
“The major problem with this [“computational thinking”]
approach is that it is concerned with teaching skills, rather
than building a CV for medical/professional school, and is
thus a slightly unusual vector for our undergraduates.”
materials/surfaces
miscellaneous comments
“You know, ironically, students are beginning to lose track
of the fundamentals that underlie the computational tools
they are using.” paleobiology
“These subjects [applied math and numerical simulation]
are difficult, and Harvard undergrads are not terrifically fond
of difficult subjects.” materials/surfaces
“Harvard... is the perfect place to pursue this type of
education.” geophysics
some conclusions
Computing challenges in the sciences will focus on large
data sets, but not just on large data sets.
The ability to bring data together from disparate sources
will be increasingly critical.
Some faculty fear that students using sophisticated tools
will lose touch with first principles or the understanding of
nature that comes from direct observation and
experimentation.
There is concern about levels of quantitative skill among
science students and cynicism about motivation.
Scale is seen as a growing challenge across the sciences,
and computational skill as necessary for meeting that
challenge.
experimentation at Harvard
research experiences provided by IIC (18 internships, 4
REUs in first 3 years)
physical sciences and life sciences now have integrated
first-year courses
first winter session: January 2010
new undergraduate laboratories will combine wet labs with
computer labs
IIC Director Efthimios Kaxiras convening interdisciplinary
faculty committee to launch co-teaching workshops
planned addition of science projects to CS 50/51; new
numerical methods courses in School of Engineering and
Applied Sciences (lack of departmental boundaries helps!)
what can “computational
thinking” not do for science?
replace observation; scientists must first
“take their dictation from Nature”
provide young scientists knowledge of
science’s laws, principles and method
what can “computational
thinking” do for science?
help conceptualize, manipulate and analyze
novel and large databases
lead to different formulations of theory
cleave observations/data/interactions/natural
systems into computable pieces; abstract
them; represent and model them; map
results back to the real world