this post was submitted on 12 Dec 2023
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submitted 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) by wischi to c/[email protected]
 

https://zeta.one/viral-math/

I wrote a (very long) blog post about those viral math problems and am looking for feedback, especially from people who are not convinced that the problem is ambiguous.

It's about a 30min read so thank you in advance if you really take the time to read it, but I think it's worth it if you joined such discussions in the past, but I'm probably biased because I wrote it :)

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Also PIMDAS (we had this conversation in my class this semester as we had a very wide range of ages and regions present in the class) (I is for indices) (I don't remember what the Colombian students said, for some reason we had a group of 3 Colombians in our class of 12 nowhere near Colombia)

That said, the question is ambiguously written. Maybe the popularity of this will result in calculators being more consistent with how they interpret implicit multiplication signs.

(my preference is to show two lines, one with the numerator and one with the divisor)

[–] SmartmanApps 1 points 6 months ago

That said, the question is ambiguously written.

No it isn't.

Maybe the popularity of this will result in calculators being more consistent

The only brand of physical calculator which is inconsistent is Texas Instruments, and it's right there in the manual that they disobey The Distributive Law. E-calculators are another issue altogether (that's what happens when programmers don't check they have their Maths right first) dotnet.social/@SmartmanApps/111164851485070719

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

PIMDAS? Isn't that the same as PEMDAS?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

So's BOMDAS etc.? Just different words for things

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Mutiplication or Division first then? Thus, BEDMAS or PEMDAS?

[–] SmartmanApps 1 points 6 months ago

It literally doesn't matter - there's no multiplication in this question anyway. i.e. there's no multiplication signs.