A Memory of Teaching

I am enjoying teaching quite a bit now that I no longer do it. With some things it is not the doing of it that we like so much as the having done it.

One day in class I carefully explained the abbreviation ‘iff’ often employed by philosophers and mathematicians to avoid writing ‘if and only if.’ I explained the logical differences among ‘if,’ ‘only if,’ and ‘if and only if.’ I gave examples. I brought in necessary and sufficient conditions. The whole shot. But I wasn’t all that surprised when I later read a student comment to the effect that Dr. V. can’t spell ‘if.’