Math, inasmuch as is learned by the end of high school, still has wrong answers.

At the high school level, the art lies in convincing your teacher that your answer is right, but the assumptions of the question are wrong.

If you can pull it off, you’ve got a bright future in number theory.

@Ralph: great article. As I’ve studied mathematics, I continue to tell people that it is not about numbers and formulas but about pattern finding. Numbers and formulas only are one single expression of some of those patterns. Other expressions are: paintings, music, poetry. I remember a recent discovery, that patterns in arabic architectural decorations match the penrose tilings.

I’ve calmed down since last week, so I’m not going to be ranting like I initially wanted to. I did want to say, though, that I do feel that contrary to the author’s opinion, mathematics is much much MUCH more heavily qualified than other artistic media. Language has (post)modern freeform poetry, and other contexts where the rules have less application and going outside them isn’t wrong. Math, inasmuch as is learned by the end of high school, still has wrong answers. The student is still constricted, though I will note that (less than) a hundred years ago English as a subject was every bit as restrictive.

You do have to learn the rules to know the best ways to break them, that’s true for both as well. And now I’m thinkning of how one would compute an Anarchy Quotient for different modes of expression.

the best math class I have ever had was my Geometry class

In my high school geometry course, all I had to do was tell the teacher’s assistant what grade I wanted. The instructor was too busy zoning out or sleeping off his hangover. He made all of his money from selling real estate anyway. That was definitely one of my favorite courses. Cautious me, I passed with a B+.

But if it was just freaking two weeks’ worth of material, what the hell did I miss? Also, the whole thing was kinda awesome.

“Children are expected to master a complex set of algorithms for manipulating Hindi symbols, unrelated to any real desire or curiosity on their part, and regarded only a few centuries ago as too difficult for the average adult.” <3

[...] Koster brought “Lockhart’s Lament” to my attention, and it resonates with my experience.  I managed to find a deep fascination [...]

I skipped probably 40% of the homework for that class, played a lot of chess, and fostered a lifelong obsession with origami. I spent a lot of time with puzzles. I even derived a way to trisect an angle, which was thought to be impossible. Of course, my method only worked on 90% angles, but still, it was a nice exercise in experimental thinking and challenging assumptions. (And I proved to myself why my method wouldn’t work on other angles, answering the questions that I put to myself.)

I got more out of that class than any other math class, college calculus included. I still love math.

(As an aside, I find the process of figuring out the problem to be the point in and of itself, so the fact that it’s been solved already wouldn’t bother me in the slightest. The fact that it was hard would make it worth it. I can understand that lots of people don’t feel that way, but I doubt many of them become mathematicians either.)

As an argument that applied mathematics is more than just application of wrote rules, this Lament is quite interesting. From a practical standpoint, the basic wrote activities in math are still important to learn despite the calculator, just like spelling is still important to learn despite the spell checker. (And, gosh, I’m suddenly insecure about my spelling and grammar. (;_;) )