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mugtang

56% of Americans believe we shouldn’t teach Arabic Numerals

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8 hours ago, Nevada Convert said:

Chinese and Japanese that have come here, vote, and I can’t see us teaching their systems. Lots of Russians have come here, and I can’t see us teaching Cyrillic. There’s tons of conservative Jews in the US, and we’re not going to be teaching three different systems of Hebrew, Yiddish and Aramaic. We have tons of Indians from India here, we ain’t going to teach theirs. There are tons American Indians in the US, and we’re not teaching them their tribal languages and counting systems. 

So in the basic curriculum that all students have to learn, there’s just not enough time to teach every culture’s counting systems, language, etc. So, absolutely not. 

Right now Muslims are enjoying the benefits of being the poster child for the PC left, and that’s the only reason why it’s being questioned, and even a thread started about it. You should be able to learn anything legal that you want in this country, and you can. But that doesn’t mean it’s important enough to put it in the basic curriculum. When you start making exceptions for one or two things, then it’s a slippery slope. 

 

dude, "Arabic" simply means zero based as opposed to Roman, which doesn't contain a zero

“Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.”

-Richard Feynman

"When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators."

-P.J. O’Rourke

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8 hours ago, Nevada Convert said:

Chinese and Japanese that have come here, vote, and I can’t see us teaching their systems. Lots of Russians have come here, and I can’t see us teaching Cyrillic. There’s tons of conservative Jews in the US, and we’re not going to be teaching three different systems of Hebrew, Yiddish and Aramaic. We have tons of Indians from India here, we ain’t going to teach theirs. There are tons American Indians in the US, and we’re not teaching them their tribal languages and counting systems. 

So in the basic curriculum that all students have to learn, there’s just not enough time to teach every culture’s counting systems, language, etc. So, absolutely not. 

Right now Muslims are enjoying the benefits of being the poster child for the PC left, and that’s the only reason why it’s being questioned, and even a thread started about it. You should be able to learn anything legal that you want in this country, and you can. But that doesn’t mean it’s important enough to put it in the basic curriculum. When you start making exceptions for one or two things, then it’s a slippery slope. 

 

So you're a "no", then?

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19 minutes ago, Lester_in_reno said:

60 % of Americans think Toronto is located next to Alaska. 

Does that mean you can see not only Russia, but also Toronto from Alaska?

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2 hours ago, SDSUfan said:

dude, "Arabic" simply means zero based as opposed to Roman, which doesn't contain a zero

 

giphy (1).gif

While you are correct, zero is a difference between Roman and Arabic numerals, that is not "simply" all the difference. 

"BYU is like a 4-year-long church dance with 20,000 chaperones all waiting for you to forget to shave one morning so they can throw you out." -GeoAg

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If this was extended to algebra, I'd be all for it.

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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45 minutes ago, Naggsty Butler said:

 

giphy (1).gif

While you are correct, zero is a difference between Roman and Arabic numerals, that is not "simply" all the difference. 

Perhaps you could enlighten us all and give us the 2nd and 3rd most important distinctions between the systems and how they could be realized without the use of zero.

 

 

“Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.”

-Richard Feynman

"When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators."

-P.J. O’Rourke

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1 hour ago, SDSUfan said:

Perhaps you could enlighten us all and give us the 2nd and 3rd most important distinctions between the systems and how they could be realized without the use of zero.

 

 

Well for starters, Hindu-Arabic has 10 unique characters as opposed to Roman's 7: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 for Arabic, and I, V, X, L, C, D, M for Roman. It is harder to represent all of the numbers in the Roman system, considering there are only 2 symbols that can represent a single digit with a single symbol: 1(I) and 5(V). You have all 10 digits from the Arabic system to represent a single digit. Of course, there are advantages for the Roman system, as you can represent a multi digit number with a single symbol, e.g. 10(X), 50(L), 100(C), 500(D), and 1000(M). 

Also, the Romans did not have a way to represent fractions. 

There are other differences. You can Google them if you want.

"BYU is like a 4-year-long church dance with 20,000 chaperones all waiting for you to forget to shave one morning so they can throw you out." -GeoAg

l.jpg

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2 hours ago, Naggsty Butler said:

Well for starters, Hindu-Arabic has 10 unique characters as opposed to Roman's 7: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 for Arabic, and I, V, X, L, C, D, M for Roman. It is harder to represent all of the numbers in the Roman system, considering there are only 2 symbols that can represent a single digit with a single symbol: 1(I) and 5(V). You have all 10 digits from the Arabic system to represent a single digit. Of course, there are advantages for the Roman system, as you can represent a multi digit number with a single symbol, e.g. 10(X), 50(L), 100(C), 500(D), and 1000(M). 

Also, the Romans did not have a way to represent fractions. 

There are other differences. You can Google them if you want.

Look at all those zeros

“Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.”

-Richard Feynman

"When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators."

-P.J. O’Rourke

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12 hours ago, CPslograd said:

Most people dont know 0-9 are arabic numerals.  They just think they are "numbers".

 

73% of Republicans said no.   Wonder how that aligns with percent that has a college degree?  Pretty sad.  When I was young, the Republicans were the more educated party.    

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14 hours ago, modestobulldog said:

History trivia gotcha.  There appears to be no control in obtaining opinions for / against teaching other systems.  The article does not state the specific question (s).  Questions can be misleading, they could have been asked in a way that a normal person would assume that it was not already taught and of little benefit to add to cirriculum.

Also left out of discussion:

“Sorry to break this to everyone but it appears neither side has a monopoly on blind prejudice."

Unfortunately, these stunts performed on both sides do little to spark dialogue, address fears and bias.  We are so polarized, we have to defend our side no matter what.  

History Trivia my ass.  They teach this shit in the 5th grade.   

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7 hours ago, sactowndog said:

History Trivia my ass.  They teach this shit in the 5th grade.   

I agree they teach it, but it is an interesting and mostly irrelevant fact that most will forget in short order.  

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21 hours ago, soupslam1 said:

Weren’t we all supposed to be converted to the metric system by now? Seems like thirty or forty years ago that was the goal. It sounds like Americans just don’t know their numbers. 

I prefer the metric system, but I'm comfortable operating in both systems.

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6 hours ago, CPslograd said:

Algebra is fine.

Calculus is nonsense.

Who invented Calculus? Someone swarthy?

Planning is an exercise of power, and in a modern state much real power is suffused with boredom. The agents of planning are usually boring; the planning process is boring; the implementation of plans is always boring. In a democracy boredom works for bureaucracies and corporations as smell works for skunk. It keeps danger away. Power does not have to be exercised behind the scenes. It can be open. The audience is asleep. The modern world is forged amidst our inattention.

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