That’s when my grades started to plummet. I thought calculus would be a breeze since I had always had good grades before that (till the end of secondary school).
…then came the endless stream of memorising theorems and proofs. Not a single digit in sight, just the entire Greek, Cyrillic and Klingon alphabets.
With a masters degree in mathematics, my response when someone wants me to do mental math is something like, “I can barely even count”, in reference to combinatorics, while I pull out my phones calculator.
It is only surprising if you think mathematics is more or less equivalent to arithmetic.
I was “bad at math” all the way through school and it wasn’t until I realised how wrong this is that it finally clicked. I still cannot calculate shit unless I have pen and paper but I usually have access to this when solving integrals. I went into a math heavy program at uni without any issue.
I remember reading a while ago that it is actually a problem in education that the only ones who pursue math degrees ate those who could easily grasp the arithmetic heavy parts of math, resulting in a narrow presentation of what math really is throughout school.
I’m about to get a PhD in math, and I am not the best at mental arithmetic either. I used to be really bad, but teaching has forced me to improve by a lot. It was very annoying for me to go back and forth between my notes/computer and the blackboard whenever there was a big multiplication, so I just slowly got better at doing it in my head. Also, it had the added benefit of letting me improvise more.
My college roommate got insanely good at it when he set an alarm on his phone that required him to do some calculation before he could turn it off. After about one semester, he was doing those half asleep lol. I think he finally decided on an alarm that would need him to walk outside and scan a QR code to turn off.
Another method to get good at mental arithmetic: At the supermarket checkout, pay in cash—and do your best to minimize the number of coins you end up with. Start calculating right after you’ve put your groceries on the checkout conveyor belt: Pour all your coins in your hand and then calculate in advance which coin combination you would give for which grand total that might result (or just for the decimal places thereof).
Judging by how many people say I should calculate restaurant bills it must be pretty surprising… I always relate the scenes of my PhD supervisor trying to split up a bill at a table full of mathematicians :P
The study of mathematics requires surprisingly little arithmetic.
That’s when my grades started to plummet. I thought calculus would be a breeze since I had always had good grades before that (till the end of secondary school).
…then came the endless stream of memorising theorems and proofs. Not a single digit in sight, just the entire Greek, Cyrillic and Klingon alphabets.
With a masters degree in mathematics, my response when someone wants me to do mental math is something like, “I can barely even count”, in reference to combinatorics, while I pull out my phones calculator.
Yeah when you get to university level maths you start pulling out calculator to check whether 2+2 really is 4 or you just made a mistake
Similarly, don’t expect much help with history questions in pub quiz from someone with a history degree.
“You have a whole ass degree, why can’t you tell me when Garfield was president!!?!?!??”
“It’s not like that … my thesis was on medieval crop rotation “
I gave a geography degree and absolutely can’t tell you where shit is on a map.
But if you need a watershed modeled I’m your guy.
Was John Arbuckle his vice president?
I have a friend who has a PhD in medieval Malian history and he trounced me in french history trivial pursuit 😭
It is only surprising if you think mathematics is more or less equivalent to arithmetic.
I was “bad at math” all the way through school and it wasn’t until I realised how wrong this is that it finally clicked. I still cannot calculate shit unless I have pen and paper but I usually have access to this when solving integrals. I went into a math heavy program at uni without any issue.
I remember reading a while ago that it is actually a problem in education that the only ones who pursue math degrees ate those who could easily grasp the arithmetic heavy parts of math, resulting in a narrow presentation of what math really is throughout school.
I’m about to get a PhD in math, and I am not the best at mental arithmetic either. I used to be really bad, but teaching has forced me to improve by a lot. It was very annoying for me to go back and forth between my notes/computer and the blackboard whenever there was a big multiplication, so I just slowly got better at doing it in my head. Also, it had the added benefit of letting me improvise more.
My college roommate got insanely good at it when he set an alarm on his phone that required him to do some calculation before he could turn it off. After about one semester, he was doing those half asleep lol. I think he finally decided on an alarm that would need him to walk outside and scan a QR code to turn off.
Another method to get good at mental arithmetic: At the supermarket checkout, pay in cash—and do your best to minimize the number of coins you end up with. Start calculating right after you’ve put your groceries on the checkout conveyor belt: Pour all your coins in your hand and then calculate in advance which coin combination you would give for which grand total that might result (or just for the decimal places thereof).
Judging by how many people say I should calculate restaurant bills it must be pretty surprising… I always relate the scenes of my PhD supervisor trying to split up a bill at a table full of mathematicians :P
Arithmetic is useful, but they should teach it through Slay the Spire or something.
Keep math class for the fun stuff.
I had to learn how to do maths with a computer and work around the limitations of not being able to draw the funky symbols to be able to do it.
I don’t fuck with it when it’s got the symbols though, I let a intern or junior “learn” on that 🫣💀