Ask Lemmy

I think a lot of it comes down to how people were taught math.

In my generation, it was almost all rote memorization. You memorize times tables. You memorize the steps to do long division. You memorize specific formulas. And then you have to draft it all into proofs to explain why things work, but you were never really taught why things work in the first place. The answer was always "It just does."

Rather than rote memorization, a better use of time for younger students is to focus more on the logic of math, to really get that "why" component before asking them to complete dozens of repetitive problems for homework.

Other parts of it might also just come down to entertainment value, to be honest. Here's where my perspective veers further into anecdote, but maybe it rings true for others, I don't know.

Learning about aphantasia was a new one for me. I don't have it, but I am acquainted with two people who do, and both of those people did well at math in school but hated history and literature. On the other hand, those were my favorite subjects, because being able to immerse myself in a story or put myself in a certain time and place made those subjects more bearable, sometimes fun.

It occurred to me that the way they felt reading books was probably a lot like how I felt doing math: just a lot of reading information on a page and memorizing important details to regurgitate later for some assessment or another. But for them, the logic of math probably made that subject easier to engage with than something as vague as an author's intent.

I was told that mathematics was a language to describe world, but I was virtually never able to make the connection between what I was taught and real world applications, so it all seemed pointless, and I'm really bad at remembering things I don't understand and have a use for.

fanbase is cringe

because it's so easy to get it wrong and very hard to get it right. there is NO room for error like there is in languages or social studies. If i make a typo or a grammatical mistake in an essay it's not the end of the world... in math it completely destroys you.

and it gets worse as it gets more advanced. my calc 3 + 4 bombed because I make a few simple mistakes here and there and it destroyed my entire exam. It sucked balls to work so hard only to end those classes with a C average because no matter how hard i studied i could make a simple error on the exam and derail my entire problem set.

most people do not have the capacity for detail that higher mathematics requires beyond arithmetic and basic algebra... and that's OK. I am not sure why calculus is required of high school students who aren't going into sciences either. A lot of people lose math in algebra 2 or pre calc and for good reason and I'm not sure they should be forced to take it.

I think USA in particular has horrible approach to education in general, and sciences and math especially because it forces so many people who dont' want to learn that stuff and are not good at learning it... to learn it and then it tells them they are stupid for not being good at it. And on the flips side... for people who are good at it it's seen as some inherent genetic trait, when it isn't.

programming is similar. i gave up on it after 3 courses when i realized i would waste hours of time only to later realize I had put a : instead of a ; and it had derailed the entire program.

conceptually i never struggled with math or programming. but i also have horrible 'innate' grammar/language as well from being born into a poor family. but making grammar errors on my papers never sunk my grades in college the way math errors did.

I like algebra, it's logical and understandable for me. But calculus just falls out of my head the minute I take my eyes off of it.

I am an accountant, I love numbers and number trivia, little puzzles.

But math math, like beyond algebra? Not as much.

And early math, like arithmetic, was poisoned by bad teachers and bad teaching methods. I didn't like it before algebra, it was boring.

I'm good at math but I'm slow at it. I would need my own time to solve a problem. But school always needed it done in a very short amount of time.

I hated math until about a year after I got into the trucking industry and realized I could use the math I had learned in school to make my job easier. Over time, I stopped needing the math and was able to just eyeball it, but it really helped for the first few years.

I agree with you. I don't hate math, I just hate the way I was taught it. I'm not diagnosed, but I've long suspected I have ADHD or autism, and so anything that isn't interesting to me I tend to just obliterate from my mind. If I had been taught math through video games or game programming, or something like that, I would have paid more attention.

It happened again during college, with a professor just shouting his lessons, and not really giving any practical examples. I almost failed, until I went on YouTube and found many professors giving very good explanations, with visuals and such (this was almost 15 years ago, when YT was less algorithmic; even the comments were helpful).

I’m bad at it and I get numbers mixed up pretty easily.

Example: I went to a pro sports game over the weekend. I sat 4 of us in the wrong row because I read the row number wrong. I saw row 12 but read row 15. I tend to mix up numbers like that often and then I get the answers to math problems wrong. This is highly frustrating to me and it makes me not like math very much.

I don't trust math. Something doesn't add up here.

It's just extremely difficult for me to hold a value in my head and perform an operation against another. I do understand the operations though, the concept is fine, the problem is that of numerical values. Numbers. I'm horrible with them. Always had problems remembering important historical dates, my own personal numbers (ids, age, etc). Because it's such a struggle it becomes very tiring very quickly, and frustrating. That's what's hard.

I don't think this applies to everyone but the major difference I have found between people who enjoy math and those who don't lies primarily in how they do math. People who don't like math usually learn and reproduce the subject by memorizing formulas and using them as tools to solve problems where as people who enjoy mathematics typically seek to understand why those formulas work and often rederive them. For the former who didn't take the time or was not interested in learning the laws that govern math, the subject is a slog of searching your tool box for the correct tool. Sometimes numerous times until you find the one that works, though often not knowing why it worked and the others did not. For the latter it is like a language they have become fluent in. The indentification of which tool they need has become second nature and they will sometimes design tools specific to their needs.

Edit: I saw all this from my experience as a physics major for most of my undergrad. This primarily comes from what I observed in other physics majors so this could be somewhat skewed info. I'm certain there are people who understood math from the roots up and still hated it. Puzzles like that aren't for everyone and I certainly got tired of it by the time I reached up level math.

I think for people like me, it isn't that we dislike math. It's that we dislike having to work out the formulas without there being much instruction on what the formula is doing. I want to know the theory behind it. Explain, at least once in a while, what is happening in the formula. Without context of what the calculations and formulas are doing (including refreshers on the basics) it starts to become just a jumble of meaningless numbers.

I find that my understanding of math is much better when I can see each step written out in long form. Once I understand what is happening, using the formulas is much easier.

If the instruction is just a string of memorization exercises, I will pass the test when it is given, but would I fail that same test just a few months later because I will have no context to give it meaning and I will forget most of it.

I don't dislike math but im better at shape oriented ones like geometry and calculus as opposed to algebra and differential equations. as far as basic stuff I like suduko and doing price per unit measurement at the store just to be somewhat practiced in it.

I got tired of crying from anxiety from attempting to do math, and the teacher not understanding that I can't learn by just looking at other problems on the blackboard that I couldn't understand.

my brain functions different from most with math, and teachers couldn't adapt to how I needed to learn so I always broke down and was then ignored. never cared for math and just restored to calculators, even to this day. just can't do it.

I enjoy solving problems and tinkering, in math class the problem were always way too theoretical. In physics that same math became interesting because it had an application.

It doesn't answer any questions I'm interested in.

I do the basics because I have to budget. Interpreting and understanding statistics are helpful at work. Sometimes I build things, and sometimes math helps.

Because through my game development career I learned to solve mathematical problems algorithmically, and my brain is just structured that way, I cannot do formulas. Well I can, but it takes active fighting against my brain structure.

I had one of those old-school maths teachers who hates maths, teaching, and children.

Had to figure out on my own that maths can be fun and useful.

Because I only have a limited amount of dopamine to spend each day, and I rather not waste it on something as boring as math. ADHD does not allow me to pursue things that don't interest me unless I'm forced to.

Neurotypical people with plenty of dopamine to spare may struggle to understand the concept of their brain physically stopping their body from doing anything that doesn't feel satisfying, nor rewarding to do. But it's a real thing that happens.

I think there's no way to tell if most people would enjoy math under the right circumstances but in my case you are absolutely right. Back in school I hated it, didn't wan't to find out more or even retain what I had to learn for tests.

That changed drastically when I studied philosophy. I learned about scholars there who "practiced" math in an almost spiritual way. Just by engaging with it, exploring this abstract world and uncovering its mysteries. Even if you don't take it quite this far philosophy and math are very closely related. It's probably gonna be tough for someone without a rough grasp of essential mathematical concepts to engage with metaphysics or formal logic.

Now that I'm a mechatronics technician I even need math in my day to day life, a lot more than I had ever anticipated. And I like it. I like how no matter how counterintuitive the method, if math says it works then it will. It's not just an abstract world of it's own, it's also woven into our world wherever you look.

I somehow feel that you're getting a small sample size here

Because my brain had/has enough room to hold diagraming sentences or higher mathematics. And I chose the one that allows for me to insult people in a way where they know I'm insulting them, but are unable to articulate how I'm insulting them.

In school, I liked anything related to geometry where there were shapes and things to look at (note that I liked it, not that I was good at it). Anything more abstract was just juggling numbers to me, it all meant nothing, I never knew why I was doing anything.

I never sucked but I'm bad at abstract thought (if you can call it that), so I never enjoyed math. I'm much more of a visual/ auditory learner. Things like geometry were easy, but once I got to calculus I said "fuck this".

I just don't care for it. I know it matters and makes up all our rules for the physical world and everything but it's not interesting to me. I'm much more interested in social/psychological studies of life, so math talk just flies over my head most of the time.

Also would agree with you about the educational system though. Growing up I was always held back and taken aside because I wasn't doing the math either fast enough or "the right way". I learned different tricks for multiplication than were taught at my school, but I would get to the correct answer. I was punished for this. It also shouldn't matter how fast you can do math, as long as you're getting the right answer. I fucking hated "math minutes" and had a lot of shitty teachers. Had some good ones too though.

it's not that I don't like it, I just don't like it as much as I used to.

I wanted to be a math teacher once upon a time. then, one year the teacher I really looked up to held the entire class back for over two months because 3-5 students couldn't grasp sin cos & tan. it should have taken us three weeks but instead took us almost three times as long.

by the end of it, the students that still didn't grasp it still didn't grasp it and the students that did grasp it no longer grasped it.

I was burnt out on it and honestly threw myself into tech just to get the fuck away from math.

worked out in my favor. teachers get paid three to four times less than I do currently, so it was a win.

I still couldn't give a fuck about sin cos & tan.

I took A Level Maths, and I just find it really tiring mentally far more than any other task I do, so after doing some practise and still having to do more, I found it draining and unpleasant. Some people say they enjoy the process, I just don't. I don't know exactly why, I just don't feel the same surge of pleasure that others do when they solve a problem I guess. I like programming though, which is applying maths, and I like being able to use maths to active my goals. I don't enjoy doing it for its own sake.

Although i do like math, it's very easy for me to understand why someone wouldn't. Just think about any subject that you dislike, and now you know the approximate feeling of someone not liking math

the education system failed them, teaching in a way that’s not enjoyable.

Yeah, pretty much. I had to learn a ton of math, where I never got explained what it could be used for. And when it can be applied in an obvious way, namely physics, most of the complexity lays in memorizing a ton of one-letter-abbreviations and formulas, which feels pointless, too.

I'm a programmer now. That was always easy to me, because the best way to learn that is by gradually solving harder puzzles. You don't just sit in a classroom and get told all the solutions to all the puzzles...

I’ve grown in appreciation for math in the last couple of years, especially when it comes to things that are necessary or practical in my day to day life.

I hated it in school though, mostly because of bad teachers, I think, and because it’s an area of study with cut and dry answers.

I always preferred subjects where there were many possible answers to a question, like philosophy and such.

I was plenty good at maths up to the point where I couldn't study more (as in, my other subject choices locked me out of taking the next stage, A-level). However in general I found the more complex stuff abstract and characterless.

For example statistics bored me. We're working out the upper quartile something something? To what end?

I've used maths for accounts, programming, carpentry, and so forth, but that's always been fairly basic stuff. The more advanced stuff has never been of the slightest value to me (I still don't know why I, a layman, should give a shit about factorisation, prime numbers, happy numbers, etc..). I am not saying that it has no value - simply that to me personally it might as well be memorising the principles behind a naming scheme for shades of grey paint. I can learn the principles and they make sense, but so what?

I pretty much felt the same way about the higher levels of chemistry. Oh these are ionic bonds? Okay..?

My teachers were excellent and enthusiastic (my entire maths class got the highest grade possible, myself included) but I don't really see what there is to like. I didn't dislike it, I was just indifferent. The easier stuff could be like a basic puzzle game, the more complex stuff I could apply the system I learned and provide the correct, if pointless, answer.

It felt like being taught someone else's complex system for sorting different sizes of white paper, I suppose I could say.

It was fine until some insane motherfucker decided to get the alphabet involved. Nope, fuck your x to the power of a squared equals unknown, I'll stay over here where the sane people are.

Geometry is okay I guess. Shapes and shit. Much better than letters.

Simply put what you find easy somebody else doesn’t and same in the reverse.

What do you enjoy? Somebody else won’t. Everybody’s mind is wired differently. It’s very much the same reason. Why one person will enjoy working on their car. Getting their hands greasy and the next person would never enjoy that.