Must be future engineers...

[QUAZY50]

Originally Posted by markem

I like to ask grad students this question:

What is the shortest distance between two points?






You see, the average student immediately goes back to some half remembered statement from a 7th grade teacher but the question that they answer is "What is the shortest distance between any two points?" rather than the one I asked. The answer to the question I asked? Zero.

Sorry I don't want to derail the thread, but I love the OP.

It is as important to understand the question as it is to know the answer.

I must not understand this question then. If the answer is zero then they are the same point, making it one point. I would argue the answer, a straight line, is correct to the question you posed, otherwise there are not two points. (I am an electrical engineer, just out of school, but I got the degree lol.)

Am I wrong?