this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2024
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Showerthoughts

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PEMDAS is technically correct, but morally wrong (self.showerthoughts)
submitted 10 months ago by Chainweasel to c/showerthoughts
28 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

If we're supposed to be able to understand math as easily as a language, we should be able to read it from left to right like a language.
Yes, I know there's lots other languages that go right to left or top to bottom, but the point is you don't have to go jumping around the page or sentence figuring out which word should be read first based on which characters it contains.
We put the first word first, then the second word second, etc.
Why can't we just write equations in the order they were meant to be solved?

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[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Yes having equations written in a more straightforward way might make it easier for laypeople to understand but I think that the people who use their head for anything more complicated than a+b and don't just use a calculator can probably figure it out fine.

[โ€“] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago

Also don't understand the "morally wrong" argument. Just because something is slightly more complicated than it could be doesn't make it "morally wrong".