I Am Glad to See Google's Science Books Online (4/26/2008)
Recent internet offerings like You Tube, Yahoo Answers, Wikipedia provide
people a fast lane to learn new things. Publishers like Springer-Verlag and
School like University of Cambridge have also created similar reference web
sites. These creations originate from good intentions. However, there is no
shortcut when studying science. The study of science must be step-by-step. If
one has questions in science, the above web sites only lead him or her from one
fragmental piece of information to another. They can rarely answer one's
question completely. Therefore, we must resort to textbooks for a complete
solution. Google's science books online is a good place to search. On a couple f
occasions I was able to access books published more than a hundred years ago.
Within minutes the desired page appeared and was at the disposal of my
fingertips. One no longer needs indices, catalogues, interlibrary loans, or even
classes. All one needs is a search engine. The consumer prices in capitalistic
economy are dictated by the market. The tuition for college runs out of control.
If one has enough training and can access Google's science books online, one can
receive an education for free. This alternative will eventually force the
tuition for college in the United States to go down.