puzzling out the proofs for concepts so utterly fundamental to math by myself that it’s like if Genesis 1:3 was And God said, 'Let there be integer,' and there was integer

    • hexaflexagonbear [he/him]
      ·
      2 months ago

      I'd suggest doing introductory analysis prior to topology. Having a bit of concrete experience with the topology of R helps motivate a lot of the basic definitions and results.

      • Tomorrow_Farewell [any, they/them]
        ·
        2 months ago

        I'd suggest doing introductory analysis prior to topology

        Pretty sure that is covered under 'calculus' in English-speaking countries. Is that not so?

        • hexaflexagonbear [he/him]
          ·
          edit-2
          2 months ago

          Only if it's the math major version of the course at elite institutions, at least in the US. Typical versions of calculus will probably at best discuss epsilon-delta definition of a limit. They won't discuss topics like connectedness or compactness, and when covering the Riemann integral they will use a version that only works for continuous (and can be extended to piecewise continuous) functions, but the definition can't answer some basic questions like "is this function Riemann integrable".

          • Tomorrow_Farewell [any, they/them]
            ·
            edit-2
            2 months ago

            Only if it's the math major version of the course at elite institutions, at least in the US

            Huh? Wow, I guess the west is this barbarous. Seriously, those topics were covered in the first semester in my case, with the primary textbook also taking a topological approach (without introducing topology explicitly - just working with the metric notion of open sets, though).

            Commercialised access to higher education has been a scourge upon your education, or seems.