re: Bizarre Math Question and Answer breaks the internet - Sorry if already posted

quote:

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No offense, but that doesn't make your opinion more valid than mine.

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Didn't imply that it did - and I never take offense to statements made on any anonymous message board.

I THINK I was agreeing with you absolutely.

My anecdote was intended to demonstrate that PEMDAS was a recent invention that has no value other than to implant a flawed algorithm in the minds of elementary school students. My intention was to describe how reliance on the difference between terms and factors is the fundamental way to approach all such practical problems. PEMDAS only has relevance during arithmetic exercises in elementary school and can be ignored even then if one is careful about how a statement is written.

BTW - I was complimenting your analysis. You approached the problem as any functional engineer would approach it. I did point out however that in that approach, there had to be a divergence from the PEMDAS ritual in how you treat the "2x" as factor rather than separating the '2' from the 'x' as would be required by rigidly applying PEMDAS.

In other words, PEMDAS sucks - it has no place in an algebra world.

but it's all good - have a nice day.