Your place in the pecking order

Mathematics is far from a trivial subject. In fact, it's the very opposite of trivial, and has been so at least since the Middle Ages.

Our word "trivial" comes from "trivium", meaning "three ways". It was the lower division of the seven liberal arts, comprising three of the seven arts, grammar, logic and rhetoric - roughly, what's taught in English lessons at school.

The quadrivium (four ways) consisted of the other four subjects: arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy. Today we would only think of the first two of those as being parts of mathematics, but the ancients viewed music as being "number in time" and astronomy as "number in both space and time".

Therefore, if you're studying maths, you would be fully justified in behaving in a superior sort of way when in the company of English students. However, there is a down side. All seven liberal arts, including all the mathematical ones, were viewed as belonging to the "Low Faculty", in contrast to the "High Faculties" of medicine, law and theology. Those subjects aren't taught much at school, but if you go on to university, be sure to find out what your fellow students are doing, and act with suitable humility when the occasion requires.

Though of course, doctors aren't always very good at maths, as can be seen from the Indiana Pi story.