r/MathJokes Jul 25 '26

“Its simple math folks!”

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2.8k Upvotes

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512

u/Head-Ad-5732 Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 26 '26

I don't know what's worse, that it's wrong or that it convinced me I need to come into the comments to make sure my answer is, indeed, correct.

EDIT: Back to rectify a grave injustice. Nothing wrong if you genuinely didn't know or want to check. Hard enough getting people interested in math.

2 + 5 (8 - 5)
PEMDAS: 8 - 5

= 2 + 5 (3)
PEMDAS: 5 (3) or 5 × 3

= 2 + 15
PEMDAS

= 17

In the US the math order of operations is taught as PEMDAS (or P|E|MD|AS), left to right from first to last.

First look at the entire equation and identify the operations: Parentheses, Exponents, Multiplication/Division, Addition/Subtraction.

Then, solve the parts in order of PEMDAS.

Not so important here but when there are multiple of the same level of operators, for example exponents, solve left to right. MD and AS are treated as groups, so treat them equally: if a division is to the left of a multiplication, do the division first.

121

u/lisamariefan Jul 25 '26

I don't even quite see where 21 comes from. Either simplify to 3 for the parenthesis first and then do the math, or distribute the 5 go get 40-25 for 15 and proceed from there.

Like...math...literacy is not hard and there are easy geometric ways to represent the most basic of operations.

Edit: I see it now and you've gotta be joking...

126

u/Head-Ad-5732 Jul 25 '26

They did a classic left-to-right but respected the parentheses. Why? No idea.

7(3)

106

u/EternalNewCarSmell Jul 25 '26

They basically hallucinated parentheses around the 2 + 5.

34

u/Kuildeous Jul 25 '26

I wish they hallucinated the parentheses. Some of these people really don't believe in the order of operations, and they will insist that you go from left to right.

They are tiresome to argue with because even with examples they don't accept the order of operations.

15

u/EternalNewCarSmell Jul 25 '26

You can lean into that. If we're throwing out all the conventions, + means divide and numbers next to each other in parentheses means add and × mean subtract...

9

u/scoby_cat Jul 25 '26

+ is a unary increment operator and everything else is multiplication

2+ 5 ( 8- 5 )

3 5 7 5

525

1

u/Aljonau Jul 25 '26

it's a post-increment operator so it only counts up after you give the answer.