The previous lesson concerned the use of Mathematica as a flexible and powerful
scientific calculator. If this were all Mathematica could do, it wouldn't be a
particularly interesting piece of software. In this lesson, we'll go beyond
numerical computing and look at how Mathematica supports symbolic computing.
When you first studied math in elementary school, numerical computing was all
that you did. Math meant arithmetic in those days, and you learned to add,
subtract, multiply, and divide. As you continued in school, you began to mix
symbols into your arithmetic by solving for unknowns in word problems.
Eventually, you began doing mathematics that didn't involve finding numerical
solutions at all: factoring polynomials, doing geometry, computing limits,
and integrating and differentiating functions are all examples.
In the remainder of this lesson we'll look at a number of Mathematica's facilities
for symbolic computing. By the end you will know enough to begin exploiting
Mathematica in the other science, math, and engineering classes that you may be
currently taking.