Thread: Prerequisite?

What are the prerequisite's for Discrete Mathematics?

Thanks

Do you mean:

"What are the axioms upon which this branch of mathematics is founded?"

... or do you mean:

"What level of mathematical ability previously attained by a student is necessary in order to be able to study the subject?"

What level of mathematical ability previously attained by a student is necessary in order to be able to study the subject?

Thanks

Originally Posted by JSmith

What level of mathematical ability previously attained by a student is necessary in order to be able to study the subject?

Thanks

At the university I'm attending, the prerequisite is calculus I.

It may be different from school to school.

--Chris

I do not mean arbitrary school rules. I mean what is necessary knowledge requirement to fully understand Discrete Math?

"Fully" understand? Brain the size of a planet!

No but seriously, an understanding of integration and differentiation is a good start. You need to be fluent with algebra at the very least.

I got some crazy folds going in the old cranium.

Thanks a lot.

Originally Posted by JSmith

I do not mean arbitrary school rules. I mean what is necessary knowledge requirement to fully understand Discrete Math?

There is absolutely no way to answer your questions.
Whereas, almost everyone can agree what material needs to be included in a calculus textbook and the order in which it is presented is more or less standard.
That is certainly not true for Discrete Mathematics.
I have a collection of discrete textbooks that ranges from one written especially for secondary mathematics teachers to one written especially for computer science majors. Moreover, there is no way to get away from what you have called ‘arbitrary school rules’. If some mathematics department calls for a course in foundations of mathematics, logic & sets, then its discrete mathematics course will more than likely include counting, graph theory, and recursion. On the other hand, fully half of the texts in my collection include all of those topics in one textbook. I would also point out that most texts do not require a calculus background but do label a few problems as “requires calculus”.

If the course of study you are about to undertake goes anywhere near the works of Donald E. Knuth, you need to be very, very sharp.

Thanks for the responses.

In my context, it is directly for computer science / Donald E. Knuth work. Sorry for my assumptions. How about in this regard?

Low crystallized intelligence. Very high fluid intelligence. Time to catch up.

You could do worse than get Vol.1 of The Art Of Computer Programming and just work thru the first chapter. Then there's his Concrete Mathematics by him, Graham and Patashnik which is chapter 1 of TAOCP expanded somewhat. If you are as you describe yourself it'll be right up your street. All the prerequisites you need are in there

Great. That is indeed the case. Seems perfect that I get to go right to what I consider the good stuff.

After reading some of the reviews for that book, in many different places, I wonder if it really does deserve the snob association it gets.

I'll let you know how it works out, if you like.

Thanks again, to everyone in this thread and especially Matt who gave me the best possible answer.

I used the following textbooks to study Discrete Mathematics during my classes.

Discrete Mathematics and Its Applications, 6th Edition

Discrete Mathematics with Applications, 3rd Edition

Discrete Mathematics, 5th Edition

Wish that are useful for you.

Originally Posted by mustkara

I used the following textbooks to study

Discrete Mathematics with Applications, 3rd Edition

Wish that are useful for you.

I just got this book yesterday, and it looks pretty good. I'll be taking discrete this fall, but I'm not looking forward to the symbolic logic part(s) of this book. >_>

--Chris

Originally Posted by JSmith

Great. That is indeed the case. Seems perfect that I get to go right to what I consider the good stuff.

After reading some of the reviews for that book, in many different places, I wonder if it really does deserve the snob association it gets.

I'll let you know how it works out, if you like.

Thanks again, to everyone in this thread and especially Matt who gave me the best possible answer.

Vol 1 ot TAOCP "Fundamental Algorithms" is a very fine book indeed (as are the other volumes) also it is easy to read.

RonL