this is no surprise to me, and something that i've believed for years now. even a simple four-function calculator hinders the performance of mathematics, as people become more dependent upon the calculator to do the work their brain would normally.
take for example, my Intermediate Accounting class, a junior-level Accounting course in the Business School here at Texas A&M. Our professor would constantly tell the class to get out their calculators to do simple long division (generally with three zeros on the end to simplify things)...within seconds she'd receive an answer--from me, desk clean, pencil scribbling doodles, and a slightly bored expression on my face. I'd either do the math with a pencil in the time it took others to get out their TI-83i calculators, or I'd do it in my head and be answering her question before her question was finished. What really struck me was one day when she asked for the quotient of 25000 divided by 6 years. I promptly went through the simple schemas established by my 2nd to 4th grade teachers and subconsciously did "6 x 4 is 24. 6 times 4000 is 24000. that leaves 1000. 100 divided by 6 is 16.6666666666. That times ten is 166.66666666666. That rounded is 167 plus 4000 which equals 4167." I had answered, to the stunned amazement of UNIVERSITY juniors and seniors with generally above-average GPAs, "4167" before a single one of them had even got the cover off their calculator. After several "How'd you get that so fast?", the prof let me explain the above mental-mapping my mind learned by the time I was 8 years old. To my amazement, the rest of the class thought it was too hard for any of them to learn, and wouldn't bother believing that I'd done something I considered simple. Then I thought about the kind of math my father does in his head--four to five digit multiplication followed by standard to metric conversions. My dad never got past his second year of junior college, but he uses his mind every day, working as an ops manager for a cargo airline werehouse. Keeping my mind sharp was something he taught me long ago.
Dependence upon machines for calculation, searching, and grammatical correction has led to a less literate, less capable generation, of which I consider myself. This sort of dependence upon simplification and convenience at the expense of effort and learning can be applied universally over our eating habits, our conversation patterns, our social interactions. Kind of disheartening in and of itself.
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Originally posted by clavus
To say that I was naked, when I broke in would be a lie. I put on safety glasses.
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