/sci/ - Science & Math

>20% of the population is functionally illiterate

>>12601176
>82% of the US population did not pass Algebra 1.

>most American adults have not read a book since 8th grade

>>12601197
damn really?

>>12601190
>American problems

Public education in America has been a complete disaster for decades. Even lots of objectively intelligent high IQ kids mentally check out because it's daycare. It's tragic and it's why we are scientifically and technologically stagnating.

>>12601286
Especially the high IQ kids. They get bored very easily anyway. When the quality of education is garbage, that only gets worse.

>>12601228
I just looked it up, it's a stat from Montgomery County in Maryland a few years ago.
Trying to find more statistics brought pic related up, lol.

>>12601176
Really? Probably about a fifth of all students here in Québec go on to understand calculus, and I thought it was bad here.

>>12601228
Yes. “College” (read: remedial) Algebra is the most failed course in the US. The vast majority of Americans are innumerate.

>>12601197
It's a failure of public schools honestly. Every math teacher I had in high school was a gym teacher who reluctantly accepted teaching math and did a shit job of it. Basically everyone failed but exams got curved hard enough that administration wouldn't catch onto how inept they were. That was kind of my wake up call as to how beaurocracy tends to fuck everything up, because the game becomes maintaining the appearance of everything working as it should rather than actually making sure things are working as they should. I went through most of my adolescence believing I was shit at math, and I was because the learning environment sucked, and I went to a school system that was comparatively really good to others nearby. It wasn't till I got to college and had some competent professors that I realized I'm actually good at math and I enjoy it.

>>12602056
WAIT WAIT WAIT WAIT WAIT
I knew you guys had curved grades in uni, but do you UNIRONICALLY have curved grades in HS too? Oh no no no no

>>12602300
I don't think curving was a hard and fast policy so much as something my incompetent teacher employed on the down low to keep administration off his ass. I think this because in my 11th grade year I straight up got an E on my midterm and he curved it up to a C- without actually putting any numbers to back it up on file. I know this because not long after midterms the dude took a, shall we say, "mandatory retirement" because it finally came to light he'd been texting/dating students for like 15 years and not long after I was called into the principal's office to discuss my marks. He basically told me I had a C- in the grade book but no numbers to back it up and asked if happened to have a copy of my test to confirm. I just lied and said I threw out all of my old papers at the end of the semester and he passed me. Turns out when the dude got canned he took all his paper files with him as a final fuck you and it ended up working in my (and I'm assuming a lot of my classmate's) favor. That was pretty sweet but I just kinda wish my entire high school career wasn't a massive waste of time.

Yes, this is wy we need state enforced eugenics.

Low IQ people should be prohibited from breeding.

>>12601176
>Yet everyone and their mom not only finishes high school, but gets a college degree.
Scientists can't explain this.

>>12601176
>calculus, linear algebra
That's middle school math.
>discrete math
That's grade school math.

>>12601176
>college algebra is a thing that exists

>>12602329
What a madlad.

>>12601176
>discrete math
hey, dude. counting is HARD

>>12602357
discrete math =/= combinatorics

Learning binomials is easy shit.

>>12602357
This is why I don't even bother studying uncountable sets.

>>12602056
>it's da system's fault
i got math easily
it's not fuckin hard you just repeat what you're taught
same thing with every course
maybe a large portion of the population is just brainlets

Just asked my gf what is the highest math she had to take in university. I'm a bit shocked that it was pre-calculus because she has a BS in chemistry and a doctorate in pharmacy. I thought she was fucking with me but I checked the web site for both schools she attended and it checks out. For her BSCh she could have graduated with taking Introduction to Statistic instead of pre-calc but her pharmacy school required at least pre-calc. I'm going to give her so much shit about this next time she starts in about having a doctorate.

>>12601176
>all of the world population is filtered by IUTT

>>12602505
>pre
>fucking
>calculus

>>12601190
>90% of the population is aliterate.
>80% of math-chads not filtered by high school math are also aliterate
>the embedded spell-checker flags it as a misspelling.
>such are subsidiary to the Great Filter
And people wonder why I prefer the comfy life to any other kind of it.

>>12602505
What's the point of having a pharmacist learn advanced mathematics?

>>12602600
>High school calculus / statistics
>Advanced Mathematics

>10% of mathematicians don't believe in infinity

>>12602610
I knew you were gonna respond with that exact snarky response.
Just because something exists above it doesn't make it not advanced. Advanced is middle of the road. Basics, simple, advanced, expert, master.
Also, math isn't the be all end all of knowledge.

>>12602629
You knew some other anon would respond with that? You have truly amazing powers of geographically expansive ESP.
Universities serve as an intelligence filter, or at least they used to. Do you want a pharmacist who can't even deal with derivatives? The reduction in requirements for most degrees has been mostly because schools want to be able to enroll as many students as possible, which goes against intelligence filters. If you're not smart enough to handle something as simple as the Chain Rule, you shouldn't be in charge of handing out medicines that can kill people.

>>12602629
Most of the population doesn't even know what real math looks like.

>math isn't the be all end all of knowledge.
Math is the ultimate form of knowledge, it's the only study in existence were a definitive truth and false exist. Nothing like that exists anywhere else. Being shitty at math indicates you can't comprehend deductive/inductive reasoning and logic, huge red flag for me.

>>12602657
Those are completely unrelated. I want a pharmacist to know medicine as well as possible.
You'd see this immediately if you tried to flip this around.
>Do you want a mathematician who can't even deal with amphetamines?
Universities used to be easier to get into, the difference being that the people who went to college were doing so because they actually wanted to learn about a field and go on to further it. Also universities weren't forced to accept retards to meet quotas. Nowadays people are just doing it as an extension of the rest of regular public school.
>>12602670
See the above. Math may be the language of the universe and the best, or maybe even only, way we have to truly understand it, but it is not everything. People need to specialize in fields. If everyone spent half their time learning math at the highest levels when less than one percent would ever even use it then we'd be wasting enormous amounts of time and resources. The simple fact is that not everyone needs to learn even just calculus, let alone all of the different branches above that.
Stuff like
>If you're not smart enough to handle something as simple as the Chain Rule, you shouldn't be in charge of handing out medicines that can kill people.
and
>Being shitty at math indicates you can't comprehend deductive/inductive reasoning and logic, huge red flag for me.
make it seem like you two just wasted a ton of time learning mathematics, realized you aren't quite material to do anything groundbreaking in your field, and now attempt to measure all intelligence in reference to the mathematics that you know in a sort of sunk cost fallacy so that you can feel like you're still superior to all of those other people who spent as much time as you did learning math learning other fields.

>>12602629
Statistics and Calculus aren't advanced at all, that's a fact. Notions such as derivatives, integrals, standard deviation and sample distribution are elementary; whether we are talking about their complexity or about how fundamental they are.

Before you say I'm being "snarky", let me state that I'm not trying to be smug or condescending. But I cannot picture someone who doesn't know things such as multivariable calculus or linear algebra being even remotely qualified to be a scientist or an engineer. And let's keep in mind that she has a Bachelor's degree in Chemistry; she was meant to be minimally qualified to be a chemist.

Some just don't even try.
A true genius, me.

>>12602744
>But I cannot picture someone who doesn't know things such as multivariable calculus or linear algebra being even remotely qualified to be a scientist or an engineer.
My point is that people need to be qualified and knowledgeable in their field above all else, not that math sucks. It's just a fact that most things just won't end up being relevant to a person, mathematics or else.
>And let's keep in mind that she has a Bachelor's degree in Chemistry; she was meant to be minimally qualified to be a chemist.
Well I don't know enough about chemistry to know whether or not this level of mathematics is relevant.

>>12602872
>my point is that people need to be qualified and knowledgeable in their field above all else
You're not wrong. But it seems to me that you're thinking as if learning calculus, statistics and such was mutually exclusive with taking courses directly related to the students' field of study. Giving undergrads a few more units to go through wouldn't kill anybody.

itt a bunch of sheltered mathtards

>>12602600
As a litmus test to see if they're retarded or not

>>12602724
This is not to mention how heavily mathematics, as a discipline, is oriented toward deductive reasoning, to the point that some people who are sufficiently fluent in it to practice science or (especially) engineering in some narrow domain or other, are oblivious to the importance of a firm and comprehensive memory for detail, anecdotal or technical, to inductive reasoning. Stories about people in such professions, who fall for simple scams, are drawn into cults, or become driveling mountebanks who believe their own advertising with an almost touching trust in their own speculative excesses, are a whole genre of journalism and literature, as well as one of the greatest feast for the able satirist.

100% of America will discover 4chan

>>12602629
Its people like you who dont understand statistics or why its important to learn. Bet you think physicists are wizards and that matrices are alchemical recipes

>>12603007
Language loop detected.

Only one true daughter of God is allowed, for what came before was the Son of the God who was hateful, spiteful, and jealous.

Mashana

>>12603007
I can tell you don't study STEM, lol.
You sound like one of those communist schizos.

>>12603045
Its perspectives like mine that are ultimately self-reflection of my own suicide.

>>12603055
How many pivots to a function?

>>12601176
calculus is useless in almost every professional setting.

>>12603083
Professional breather here, are you sure I don't even need an infinitesimal of oxygen left in my lungs ever again?

>>12602505
Holy fuck, idk what uni your gf went to but as a chem major we have to go to multi var. and linear algebra at the LEAST. Break up with her man, don't raise no retarded kids

>>12603071
STEM relies on deductive reason heavily. That's what problem solving IS. You take what you know and come to a conclusion, thankfully scientists have worked out a lot of stuff for you and you can assume their results to be true safely. Pure inductive reasoning outside of research is generally not a good idea, because you WILL fuck up and come to incorrect conclusions. You know when STEM does inductive reasoning for research and papers and whatever? How do you objectively come to a conclusion with data? With statistics of course! Guess what? Statistical analysis IS deductive reasoning. You have to apply a set of axioms before you can do stats, even if you don't realize it. In fact, this were most of bad/misleading statistics come from, not following the axioms.
The thing is inductive reasoning is very unreliable, we need deductive reasoning to make it more reliable. A STEM with less deductive reasoning means a less reliable STEM.

>>12602509
>All of the world is filtered by tookers papers

>>12602619
Source?

>>12601421
Private school isn’t really that much better. A lot of the times they dump 6-8 hours of homework on you to “prepare you for college”. Granted, it seems to work but a lot of kids burn out.

>>12603136
Spotted the rapist! Is that how you stun your victims? By giving them so much varied and adaptable attention?! TEACH ME SENPAI!

>>12602386
Watching the teacher repeat the same material for 4 months on a section that was supposed to be 2 weeks long because they moved the actually mentally disabled kids to the general population courses made me hate math in high school.
Being assigned homework as 50 percent of the course grade also left a bad taste in my mouth.
I had drugs to do and alcohol to drink, no way in hell was I going to spend hours doing the 100 math problems assigned each night.
Failed the fuck out of algebra three times with a near perfect 50 percent score from tests and quizzes alone.

>>12603179
>Private school isn’t really that much better.
>A lot of the times they dump 6-8 hours of homework on you to “prepare you for college”.
That's no different from AP courses in public school.

>>12603136
So your saying STEM relies on having to sift through a lot of people's unrelated bullshit because they don't possess your language and rhetorical discipline?

>>12603154
And translated into common parlance via the Vagus conjecture.

>>12603195
not sure what you're trying to say senpai

>>12603211
Most people don't know what words work and don't, so basically word salad their way through life.
>T.Language Lover and Character Composer

In middle school social studies I did one brief oral report on Ukraine that was basically just me reciting shit I copied from the encyclopedia. The rest of the time we played cards. I learned how to play texas holdem that year.
Unsurprisingly, the teacher was a coach.

>>12603198
The vagus conjecture is rooted in evil.

>>12603249
I only pretend to sleep, I've never actually experienced what you'd call being unconscious. So yes I believe Z is ma imaginary letter sold to us by the Jewish media.

>I SUMMON ALL THE BASE!

>>12603136
Rigor in avoiding missteps in deductive chains of reasoning, while necessary to science, can be emphasized too much in specialist branches far from foundations where prior findings & hidden assumptions are tested by induction. That it isn't possible to build anything with pure inductive reasoning in any context is one of those problems that solves itself, and can do without emphasis on it.

>>12603249
So you are a value preceding an operator?

>>12603378
Reading all that felt like someone describing how water goes down the sink.

>>12603381
Replies like this give me the creeps.

>>12602505
How the fuck can you understand chemistry without understanding the schrodinger equation and therefore linear algebra and differential equations?

>>12603458
Are you a woman or something?

>>12603478
How far in depth do they go into physics normally? It can't be that far since they insist on using that weird atomic model.

>>12603157
A year long (unpublished) study I did, sampling threads pertaining to infinity on /sci/.

So can one learn integrals, derivatives and the sort in 15 days?

>>12602600
It wasn't until calc II that I understood how to mathematically model drug concentrations in blood.

>>12603478
I've seen some 4 year degrees for chemistry where the only required math was like one probability and statistics course and that was it. Granted they teach the contextual math in the chem classes themselves but still

>>12602629
>math isn't the be all end all of knowledge
it is though
t. almost every western philosopher

>>12601176
its worse than you think, because math undergrads in the US actually think they're intelligent

>>12603458
Why? Is a shared communal intelligence somehow a revolting idea or concept for you?

>>12601176
calculus only filters out white males & azns who can't do math.
women and darkies get a free pass regardless their inability to do the work.

>>12603676
there are no mathematicians on /sci/

>>12604330
is that why i can never get a straight answer about the odds of getting doubles?

>>12602619

There is a difference between proven statements, and true statements.

They do believe that there exist some proven facts about infinity, however, the only true fact they believe in is the non-existence of infinity.

>>12604348
Proven is third-party confirmation or individually reproducible results with a given instructions set.

Truth is a vector with initialized vectors that trend towards convergence.

>>12602339
"highest" math course I've heard of in high school is AP calculus BC, which would net you (i think) a college credit for calc 2 if you get a 4-5 on the exam.

>>12601190
>>12601176
HONK

>>12601176
That shit is confusing as fuck, I hate doing it, and I deliberately chose to avoid it. The only time I dabble is with hobbyist programming and that's on a per case basis. FUCK calculus

>>12601475
Lmao, I'm literally from that area. My high school was in Howard County.
Suffice to say, one county was for rich white kids and overachieving Asians/Indians. The other county was all niggers.