this post was submitted on 12 Dec 2023
857 points (96.4% liked)

Memes

45889 readers
2299 users here now

Rules:

  1. Be civil and nice.
  2. Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
857
6÷2(1+2) (programming.dev)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

https://zeta.one/viral-math/

I wrote a (very long) blog post about those viral math problems and am looking for feedback, especially from people who are not convinced that the problem is ambiguous.

It's about a 30min read so thank you in advance if you really take the time to read it, but I think it's worth it if you joined such discussions in the past, but I'm probably biased because I wrote it :)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Without any additional parentheses, the division sign is assumed to separate numerators and denominators within a complete expression, in which case you would reduce each separately. It's very, very marginally ambiguous at best.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Assumed by whom? Clearly not everyone.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

It's what is actually taught in high school, so there are those who remember and those who don't.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

You are correct with your definition - Terms are separated by operators and joined by grouping symbols - and it's consequently not ambiguous at all (using so-called "weak juxtaposition" breaks that rule).