Comment on this one goes out to the arts & humanities
SanndyTheManndy@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Billions were spent inventing and producing the calculator device.
Human calculators are now extinct.
Complex calculations are far more accessible.
Comment on this one goes out to the arts & humanities
SanndyTheManndy@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Billions were spent inventing and producing the calculator device.
Human calculators are now extinct.
Complex calculations are far more accessible.
KevonLooney@lemm.ee 7 months ago
This has a secondary effect of making average people incapable of estimation in their heads. Hopefully in the future people won’t be incapable of writing and art.
SanndyTheManndy@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Average people weren’t doing complex math in their head back when human calculators were a thing.
KevonLooney@lemm.ee 7 months ago
But they were estimating things. Somehow illiterate people ran marketplaces for thousands of years.
frezik@midwest.social 7 months ago
The entire point behind the much maligned New Math is to teach approximate solutions that you can do quickly in your head. It’s the realization that if you want an exact answer, use a calculator, but quick head estimates are still useful.
It was opposed by generations who were told to memorize multiplication tables because they wouldn’t always have a calculator available.
KevonLooney@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Well you should memorize those anyway. It’s useful all your life for easy calculation. If you want 7 items and they cost $3.50 each, it’s between $21 and $28.
NounsAndWords@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I check on the calculator I have with me at all times. It’s $24.50