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Phys. Rev. ST Phys. Educ. Res. 4, 020105 (2008)

Plasticity of intermediate mechanics students’ coordinate system choice

Eleanor C. Sayre and Michael C. Wittmann

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  30. Though individual resources are held by individuals, their expression and use in a specific context may be socially negotiated. However, we wish to draw a distinction between resources (held individually) and their appropriate expression (which may be socially determined).
  31. This is, of course, a simplification. We do not discuss here an important third state—primed—for either neurons or resources.
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  34. However, if a resource activates in two contexts, those contexts may or may not be near each other. Consider the conservation of stuff resource. In quantum mechanics, the energy of a particle is conserved as it passes through a barrier, though students may think the energy decreases (Ref. [19]). In a classic Piagetian experiment, water is poured from a short fat glass to a tall skinny one, but its volume remains the same, though children may think the volume increases (Ref. [51]). In both cases, conservation of stuff activates appropriately, but the cases bear no other resemblance. Thus, conservation of stuff could be nearby many otherwise disparate resources. Yet, if those other resources are disparate, they should not be near each other. To solve the addressing difficulty, resources need to be in two “places” at the same time. Obviously, ordinary buildings cannot have multiple locations.
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  39. Minsky (Refs. [53, 54]) uses a similar but distinct definition for frames. He is much closer to what we call a resource graph, in which ideas are recruited into the frame system, and we do not discuss it further here.
  40. For example, one might consider when certain framing activities are possible and how that depends on the readout strategies associated with a given resource graph. Perhaps only those resource graphs with appropriate readouts are available to the activity of framing. However, there is too little theoretical clarity on either end of the description for a connection to be made. Under what conditions is one unable to frame an activity in a certain way? What does it mean for a readout strategy to be unavailable in a given setting? Such questions must be answered before appropriate connections can be made between our discussion here and framing in a resources perspective.
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  44. It is a somewhat philosophical question to wonder whether a resource exists which has never activated. Because resources are defined as activatable, if it could activate (and merely has not), then it might exist.
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  49. Note that while these coordinates are not necessarily positions, the language used to describe their system is locationlike.
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