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Comment by palata

6 days ago

> I'm unconvinced that calculators have made most people a lot worse in arithmetic. There have always been people who are bad at math.

Arithmetic is a subset of maths.

14 comments

palata

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MangoToupe  6 days ago

Arithmetic is also near-useless if you have access to a calculator. It's also a completely different skill thab reasoning about numbers, which is a very useful skill.

  • nitwit005  6 days ago

    But, logically, you need to spend time thinking about numbers to be good reasoning about them, and the calculator is about reducing that time.

    I feel there's a bit of a paradox, with many subjects, where we all know the basics are the absolute most important thing, but when we see the basics taught in the real world, it seems insultingly trivial.

    • MangoToupe  5 days ago

      I understand what you're saying, but I legitimately am unconvinced learning long division is necessary to learn by hand to master division. If anything, perhaps we should be asking children to derive arithmetic from use of a calculator.

  • SoftTalker  6 days ago

    I think it’s pretty hard to reason about numbers without having mastered arithmetic. Or at least beat your brain against it long enough that you understand the concepts even if you don’t have all the facts memorized.

    • MangoToupe  6 days ago

      I disagree; i think the focus on arithmetic actually enables people saying they're "bad at math" when symbolic reasoning is a completely different (and arguably much easier) skill. You an easily learn algebra without knowing long division.

      Hell, if I had to do long division today without a computer I'd have to re-derive it.

      3 replies →

  • recursive  6 days ago

    I can do plenty of arithmetic much faster than I could type it on a calculator keypad. That's like saying hardware keyboards are near-useless if you have access to a touchscreen.