Gah, stop the mathphobia!

The BBQ Pit
41

That teacher needs an ass-kickin’.

I’m a math major. I graduate in 2004. People shy away from me at parties. I feel I should get that out of the way first.

Then I want to point this out:

Mathematics and arithmetic are intimately related, but they are two different skills. Addition, subtraction, multiplication, algebra, etc-- that’s mainly arithmetic. Our brains aren’t really structured for that. Adding long columns of numbers is very difficult. Memorizing times tables-- difficult. Even people who are “mathematically talented” have problems with this. I’ve yet to get anything less than an A- in a math class, but when it comes to calculating that 18% tip in my head, I’m hopeless. I have to give it to my partner who, thanks to years of scoring bowling games, can do that kind of thing.

Drop the arithmetic. That’s really not the whole story of mathematics. It doesn’t take a knowledge of complex numbers and recursive functions to see the beauty in fractals. The first time I fell in love with math was NOT when I learned how to partial integration or calculate eigenvalues. It was when I first understood the proof of the irrationality of the square root of two. It is a basic proof by contradiction, but what got to me was the simplicity and elegance of a logic that built its case step-by-step, drawing to an inescapable conclusion. that is mathematics, one of the most beautiful and easily the most useful language we have for explaining the universe.

A mathematician is like a musician in that it takes hard work, lots of practice, a patience for boredom & repetition and wonderful teachers to get to where you want to go. And like music, there are those moments when everything pays off-- creating the perfect proof is not unlike finding the perfect riff. It’s a pity that we are obsessed with how hard scales are when really, it’s the music we should be listening to.

42

Actually, “experimental” math worked really well for me, but then, I was a weird child. But among other things, it showed me that there was more than one way to figure something out, how to guess at which way would be the least painful to figure it out, and how to work it through the long way, anyway.
They also showed me how to play with numbers (which later translated to playing with equations, and then concepts) which was fun, so I liked math better.

But, I lucked out and got some good teachers, and wasn’t harmed by the bad ones - I later tutored people who had suffered through horrible teaching, and there is generally a concept that they never got. And apparently their teachers didn’t notice, didn’t care, or couldn’t figure out how to explain it. And since math builds on itself, the students never got what came next either, and they freeze. Which is sad.

43

To know what to put in the calculator, mayhap? If you do not know how to computer interest, for instance, a calculator isn’t magically going to impart the knowledge to you. Also, having a good grasp of math helps you double check when the calculator is wrong, and mistakes have been made.

Finally, in higher mathematics, a calculator’s use actually decreases. Last semester, I very rarely actually used my calculator to figure things out. In fact, I was using a word processor far, far, far more often than a calculator.

44

Sounds bad, but I wonder at the context. If he told you that because you could find the square root of 16, he’s an asshole. If he told you that because you claimed the numbers told you they didn’t want to be added together, maybe he had a point.

45

Right! Math just isn’t about calculation any more than writing is just about spelling and punctuation. And saying “Why do I need to learn math if I have a calculator?” makes about as much sense as saying “Why do I need to learn to write if I have a word processor?”

Oh, and my I add my applause and agreement to the OP?

46

I got up to pre-calc in high school (passing each math class with a 69.99) and I’ll admit that I am a mathphobe. I can do simple everyday stuff, but even that ends up being pretty obtuse

. For example, the only way I can do Potter’s addition problem (26+47) if I kind of break things up into chunks of five, add them up (which for me tends to be a pretty visual activity, involveing picturing all these chunks of five and counting them) and then minusing (once again visually) all the parts that didn’t really add up to chunks of five. So it can be done. Just not in any particularly sensical matter. Maybe I would have done better when we all used roman numerals.

I used to spend an aweful lot of highschool crying over my math books. When confronted with an equation, my mind just starts screaming “don’t want to do it” over and over again. Even if I can get over feeling naseous and try to solve the problem, I’ll lose track somewhere in the middle. I get lost doing long division. It’s like I see all the numbers, and I know I have to do some kind of voodoo to get some other number, but the particular voodoo I have to do, and the reason why I should even do it in the first place, and why getting that second number exactly right is so important eludes me. I get sloppy and start mixing up steps mostly because I don’t find the idea of transforming one number into a specific other number to make sense as a way to spend my evening.

I’d like to say I have some sort of learning disability. The fact that I managed to ace geometry, when I’ve never gotten about a C- in any other math class, seems to support it. But mostly I think I had a bunch of bad teachers who put a bunch of bad pressure on me, and I got scared.

47

Cool. Maybe for an encore I’ll do linear and quadratic simultaneous equations.

48

As mojave666 alluded to in his post, arithmetic is not what human brains excel at. Arithmetic is mechanical and menial and does not mesh well with the human brain’s tendancy to forget details and get bored. Arithmetic, beyond the absolutely simple tasks, is best left to machines, like those nifty hand calculators we’ve been so busy improving over the last thirty years.

I hated arithmetic when I was in grade school. I disliked it with a passion. I couldn’t memorize it and I could only figure it out myself through slow tedium. It wasn’t until later on, after I’d learned to love the manipulations of algebra and had gotten away from my grade school teachers, that I finally was able to visualize numbers well enough to see arithmetic as I could see algebra. I still don’t think of it as fun, but at least I can calculate ages with only a moment’s reflection.

49

What gets me is the cheerful way people will exclaim their crapness as if it is some kind of badge of honour. Would you be so happy about being crap at other areas of academia? Would you chuckle about how you can’t read anything more complicated than Harry Potter? Would you wink slyly whilst implying that your knowledge of history extends to the winners of Big Brother?

Mathematics is an art. A very beautiful one. I, myself, am crap at visual arts, such as drawing. This is not something of which I am proud or feel in some way marks me out as a hoopy frood. No - I wish ferverntly that I could paint with the skill of Picasso. If you simply can’t handle higher mathematics, that is more than understandable. But don’t feel that your inability makes you anything other than diminished, as my inability to paint diminishes me.

Maths and calculators? Pshaw. In my university degree, we weren’t even allowed to use calculators. Not that I even noticed, since I didn’t have to do any arithmetic more complicated than 7 x 8. Calculation is to maths what punctuation is to literature. No more, no less.

And the real kicker - “I don’t use all that stuff in real life”, they whine. Well bully for you. Actually, I do. Pretty much every day. So do vast numbers of other people working in various statistical, financial, engineering, scientific or programming jobs. Assuming that your kind of “real life” is the only kind of “real life” is the height of arrogance.

And how in the hell is a school supposed to be able to tell which kids are going to need this stuff from which are not? When I was 13 I thought I was going to be a violinist – I may well have told you that I was never going to need it. Kids don’t know what life is going to hold for them; that’s why we as adults make sure that they have the full toolkit just in case.

When I was 15 I learnt just how beautiful mathematics can be (actually mojave it was the irrationality of root 2 that got me too!) I then devoted my life to it. If some bozo had decided that I didn’t need all that stuff then I would never have learnt it. And my life would have been a great deal poorer as a consequence.

So kids, suck up your mathematics - it’s good for you and you might yet find that you like it a grat deal more than you think you do. Furthermore, you might end up needing a lot more than you thought you would.

And please. please stop the one-upmanship about just how fucking awful you are at this particular art. Believe me, it doesn’t make you look good.

pan

50

Basic arithmetic past 5+5 is very, very difficult for me. (True story: I had a copy editing instructor damn near smack me once when I kept using the Windows calculator to break things into picas and points. Apparently, it was unconscionable that I couldn’t divide by six.) We weren’t allowed to use calculators in school until algebra in 8th grade, and I spent so much time struggling (and failing) at the nuts-and-bolts of mathematics that I never got a chance to tackle the concepts involved. By the time I was old enough to get into really interesting math and trust calculators, I was so far behind on basic concepts I could never catch up.

51

I’m in a summer half-time (8 weeks instead of the usual 16) course on Differential Equations, and I’m loving it! This is coming from someone who detested math in high school (until part of senior year because I had a good teacher).

Yes, there are people who truly, honestly cannot do math at all (Discalculia and other reasons come to mind), but the number of people who have these conditions (etc) is most likely far, far, far smaller than the number of people who say, “oh, I just can’t do math”.

That said, I’m a Computer Science and Humanities dual major (and I’m sill sorta-considering switching from Comp Sci to Mechanical Engineering, which means that instead of being 1 of 4-5 girls in my classes, I’d be 1 of 1-2 in each class ;)). I do tutoring for my University in writing, and this:

made me want to say something. I go to a university which is heavily geared towards engineering. To get any degree here, you have to have a minimum of two required lit classes, two philosophy/history required classes and at least an elective or two (lit or history stuff).

You have no idea the number of engineering majors who come into tutoring who cannot write an essay. I even had to spend a couple hours with someone explaning basic grammar because, honest to Og, she did not know what a sentence is. This isn’t uncommon. Many engineering majors actively sneer at us Humanities majors (all 8 of us, heh, and most of us are dual majoring in an engineering or science major anyway!), because “at least I’m doing something useful, what the hell is Humanities gonna get you?”

These people are actively proud of not liking reading books, not being able to write essays (or complete sentences!) and not “wanting to waste time with that crap”. So yeah, they are out there, and in bigger numbers than I had thought.
[sub]Of course, it’s really sweet when I not only help them with their essay, but point out a mistake in their Calculus 2 homework, this from a writing tutor! muahahahaha![/sub]

52

Long gone are the days where high schoolers write ten or twenty page papers, at least anywhere I went to school, and the freshman English classes that I took which were a waste of my time were a joke. The first seester, I shit you not, was basically about how to write a FIVE-PARAGRAPH ESSAY. This is in COLLEGE. (I found out later I could have tested out of them. Arrgh!) Our big paper the next semester was five to ten pages. I could do five to ten pages in my sleep.

What does this have to do with math? I know people who are the same way with math. It’s easy for them. They enjoy it. I neither enjoy nor am good at math, and lest you think this is a recent thing (since high school, say), I had to get a tutor when I was in third grade to learn to multiply! While I didn’t start to hate math class until I hit algebra and was thereafter totally lost, I had problems with numbers early on. I’m not claiming a learning disability here.

I do not like math. Math does not like me. I can do basic everyday math, but when you get into the sort of algebra where it’s playing with numbers for the numbers’ own sake, I’m lost. I got a B in a basic statistics class for psych majors – the numbers had a REASON. It made a lot more sense to me.

So while I don’t understand you math lovers, I can’t understand how people can’t write a simple English paper either. I guess we’re on opposite sides of the fence, huh?

53

Well I don’t know about that. I routinely have to write 50 page expert witness reports for legal cases with a week’s deadline. I think that I’m pretty OK at the written word too.

Of course witnesses on the SD may disagree with that statement…

I see no reason why one has to be poor at one to be good at the other. If anything, I’d have thought that intelligence is intelligence and intelligent people can turn their mind to anything.

pan

54

What I don’t understand is the “I’m bad at this, so I’m not even going to bother trying” mentality, whether it’s math or grammar or art history. My whole reason for reading The Straight Dope is to learn as much as I possibly can about every topic imaginable. Learning is too damn much fun. There are plenty of topics I know very little about, and some that are less relevant to my life than others, but I never say “screw it, I’ll just let it remain a mystery.” This is especially true in a subject as vitally important as mathematics.

And for the “why study math when we’ve got calculators” crowd, here’s desdinova’s prime example numero uno:

“A savings account carries a 0.63% monthly interest rate. What is the annual rate?”

I’ll give you a hint: this cannot be solved quickly with a four-function calculator. You’ll find that whether you know it or not, being able to solve such a problem comes in handy pretty frequently in “real life.” Most people, however, just solve it incorrectly…

55

'lo bob. you got math? math goooood . . .

I’ve always loved math. I still use algebra. I even get to copyedit or proofread a math book now and then, and even though it’s not part of the job, I almost always catch a few notation or terminology errors.

Math is not always easy, but it is fascinating. I loved Sagan’s suggestion of how one might discover God in mathematics at the end of his novel Contact. It brought tears to my eyes.

I am a geek.

56

I didn’t mean to say that you HAVE to be good at one and bad at the other. My brother, for one, is good at math, and is also an excellent writer. In my experience, though, the math-haters and the English-haters just don’t understand each other. As I said, I don’t understand how somebody could get to college and not be able to write a FUCKING PARAGRAPH – even with crappy teaching, it seems FUCKING OBVIOUS to me.

In the same vein, math is FUCKING OBVIOUS to some people, and to others of us it can be an impenetrable fog.

57

I have perfectly average math skills.

Except Trigonometry. Where Trig is concerned, there is a fundamental disconnect between my ability to understand and my ability to express.

When I took the required basic math class at my college, I passed all parts of it, including complex equations, with no trouble at all.

Except the Trigonometry portion. That, I could not do at all. On the test we took during the Trig section, I got 4 out of 50 points. This despite the fact that I was able to follow everything the teacher told me in a later study session. I was, literally, incapable of putting that knowledge into practice.

Just my anecdotal evidence.

58

There are 11 used copies of Asimov on Numbers on sale at Alibris. They start at $14.95, and go up to $75 for a mint hardback edition.

59

7.8%?

60

Heh. When I hear that I say, "how many times in your life have you said something like “the car is near empty, I’m going to need gas, therefore I’d better hit a gas station on the way out of town?” It’s a pretty common example of syllogistic logic, which is a kind of mathematics. I use that to point out that logical reasoning has an intimate connection to mathematical reasoning. It’s not just about “balance the checkbooks” or “measure the wood for cutting.”

(for the record, I’m biologically female. :D)

I always think of this as “denial by arrogance”-- ie, you’re not the best writer, or books bore you, therefore since you’re so talented in one area then these things just don’t matter.

I’m a woman studies minor, which sounds like an odd combination. But I find I can bring a lot of the logic skills I learned in math when I write about the subject, and conversely I find that I can take the creativity I’ve developed due to writing about literature or cultural studies into mathematics. The combination has also honed my BS meter quite nicely. Ironically, although it’s true what the the OP says about mathphobes, another problem is that a few really bright techie people don’t think twice about spouting really ill-informed opinions about non-technical subjects. Folks, it takes as much research to understand the roots of, say, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as it does the first time you attempt a C# program. Besides, like desdinova up there states, learning is fun, and frankly, the more diversity in what you learn, the better.