@BlueStateBabe: The awful thing is that that's not all that much of a joke anymore.
I've legit seen online, read in journals, and discussed IRL with people that say mathematics is a filthy, exploitative capitalist lie, inherently racist, classist, misogynistic, and... stuff.
These folks, more than a few of who appear to be in academe, though not in mathematics or physics or the hard sciences, say "Big Math" or whatever is oppressive.
I've tried to get the gist, but it makes no sense to me.
I don't get it, either. Math is inherently neither good nor bad. It just is. Now, how it is used, is another matter altogether.
I can say with a fully clear conscience that society cannot exist without math. The absence of math would result in chaos and the downfall of civilization, if indeed one could "remove" math.
Which they can't.
@BlueStateBabe @thedisasterautist
I think there's an idea that math instruction focused on calculus excludes people who had weaker math education coming up. There are big drop offs in #s of majors, BS, MS, etc to support that. In the process statistics as a topic is delayed/lost to them. Which is a practical knowledge everyone should really have.
So the argument I've heard is, put linear algebra and stats before any mention of calculus and let stats be a terminal subject for most folks.
@BlueStateBabe @thedisasterautist
Disclaimer I am not a mathematician I just hang around with a lot of them because I was raised wrong
@b4cks4w \\\
LOL