I don't think reading one book is enough to learn linear algebra given its breadth and applicability. However the approach used in that one is very helpful if you want to learn functional analysis later on. But still, it probably should be read with other books that have more geometric flavour. Determinants are also a big magical topic of their own and show up in many areas of mathematics, so it would be a shame to banish them from the start like that.
Actually medical students have the most loans, so unless you think that medical professionals are useless or that medicine should only be practiced by the rich, you should reconsider your views.
In most countries around the world higher education is free (or almost free) if you have the grades to be admitted, it's very a natural process. The fact that you have to take enormous debts to be allowed to study (which is your only hope for social mobility) in the U.S is the exception and is honestly crazy to me. How can you even speak of 'merit' in such society?
This narrative, i.e that the global plastic pollution in the ocean is primarily caused by a handful of Asian countries is misleading. It ignores the role of countries in the global north for overproduction of plastic and for exporting plastic waste to developing countries in the guise of trade.
It also frames the problem as a "problem elsewhere", as if there is little a consumer or their local congress for that matter in global north can do.
You can see the change only at the boundaries of the grid. Away from the boundary it is just like regular game of life but at the boundaries the definition of 'neighbour cell' changes based on the way the grid is glued (i.e its topology)
Say that to a Vizier in 700 AD. He was very flabby, no doubt.