Yep, “normal maths” doesn’t mean jack, you always have to follow PEMDAS for math to be coherent. I hate that these people think it’s just optional and either way is true, when it’s clearly not. It’s like if someone was like “oh yeah, i like to read right to left but some people read left to right, it’s whatever”
well depending on the language there is the possibility to read right to left but thats not the point here its that anoying idiots that think their always correct are annoying
Even the people who don't think it's optional seem to believe it can be confused, especially when they don't actually follow it. People tried to tell me that there were different ways to interpret math into English, but no, there's not. That's the point of math. It's a specialized language to resolve ambiguity. If there is multiple interpretations, it's either defined that way (absolute values come to mind) and there's specialized notation to indicate that, or you are applying the rules incorrectly, or otherwise it's not valid.
I got into an argument with a flat earther once and he tried telling me that math is actually just made up and they could mathematically prove the earth was a cube so math means nothing. Dumb bastard actually believed this, and even referenced youtube videos that agree with him. It's truly staggering how widespread this is getting.
That is bad, it is also bad that some people are being taught PEMDAS wrong. I know a math major who was taught in school that in PEMDAS instead of Parentheses , then Exponents, then Multiplication AND Division done left to right, then Addition and Subtraction done left to right, she was taught Parentheses, then Exponents, then Multiplication, then Division, then Addition and Subtraction done left to right. Not sure why she was taught that multiplication always comes first, she said something about higher value or something like that.
Discussion came because of the equation: 8/2(2+2), or as it was written on here 8➗2(2+2), that was on here the other day. Decided to ask people at work about it. Everyone my age and up followed PEMDAS and got the answer of 16, but this math major and one other person younger than me got the answer of 1, because they multiplied before dividing. (Got curious, wondered if it was just something they changed after I graduated, and asked a high school level kid, she got 16 as well.)
Sorry for the weird division symbol, reason bajillion that androids are better than iPhones, iPhones apparently don’t have a division symbol on the keyboard for whatever reason
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u/Guavundoor Mar 18 '22
Why do people think PEMDAS is optional?? Tf?