Maths is easy

Q: Why do you hate maths?

A: They always ask me questions and riddles I can’t solve.

Q: Did you ask yourself why is maths so popular, and why do the educational systems include it to such an extent?

A: No. Yes, it’s silly. It is because there is a hype about Hi-Tech, and so everybody suffers, so that some bright guys will get the basics to be ready for university. In short – the technical market promotes it.

Q: Great, you got a part of the picture, but there is the bigger picture:

1. Maths is used in modern daily life for dealing with bills, deals, understanding many aspects of news and technical subjects.

2. Struggling with maths teach one simplicity, clarity, coherent thinking, and exercises the mind to solve puzzles and to deal with challenges.

3. School-maths is one of the very few neutral subjects that can be taught methodically to most people. It is gradual and varied enough to be accessible to all people. It is objective in the sense that there is an easily-defined right-or-wrong answer to most questions, and “unknown” or “no solution” to all others.

4. Maths, as the mother of all the sciences, constantly teaches man, on all levels, that there is always a much larger universe that is unknown. This, last lesson, is the most useful, as it teaches man to not lie about himself and his abilities. It also teaches us humility, as the unknown is always vastly larger than the known.

5. Maths has another hidden lesson – there are no rewards without efforts. No free meals. What good is that? First, it is a law of Nature, that anything worthwhile comes with work or payment of some form or another. Second, it teaches us to work for living, rather than leech on others. For this, last argument, educational systems emphasize studies of maths.

A: That is all very interesting. Still, why do you claim that maths is easy?

Q: Well, unlike our mundane tendencies to minimize efforts, payments and suffering, maths belongs to a branch of culture which believes that man is born for greatness, and not for idleness; that man is equipped for great achievements and possibilities, but to achieve them he needs to be educated thoroughly, and work hard by his own inner motivation.

Assuming that one is willing to study and work, maths in itself is easily taught. It relies on simple axioms and arguments, and builds vast mental structures built on theorems and formulas. The process of learning a new field in maths involves studying a few new formulas, trying out a few examples, and then applying these formulas to exercises.

Then comes the puzzling stage, when the knowledge is not sufficient. Now the handling of riddles branches into the unknown. This, meeting The Unknown is the first major obstacle for the faint-hearted, and the reason maths is so feared. And this ‘obstacle’ can prove a prolific source, if grasped with readiness. For that path, of studying maths is not entirely unknown or unknowable, as there are many mathematicians out there, and loads of available material. In fact, maths is easy in the logical sense that in any stage, on any question, there are only four possible answers: One set of solutions; Infinite set of solutions; No solution; or – I don’t know!

Plunge into the unknown, it is the only way home!