Comments on: Carry the one http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/ First name: Andy. Last name: Skelton. Thu, 04 Dec 2008 23:10:05 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7-RC1-10026 hourly 1 By: morag maclachlan http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/comment-page-1/#comment-1540 morag maclachlan Fri, 21 Dec 2007 21:00:33 +0000 http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/#comment-1540 left to right addition is a well known and tried and tested method in fact it is what our children are taught in school alongside right to left "traditional" addition left to right addition is a well known and tried and tested method in fact it is what our children are taught in school alongside right to left “traditional” addition

]]> By: Ben Tremblay http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/comment-page-1/#comment-1515 Ben Tremblay Tue, 18 Dec 2007 04:08:08 +0000 http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/#comment-1515 Rereading your post reminded me of Ilya Prigogine's book on chaos theory ... surprisingly readable. And that reminded me of 1985 with Martin Gardiner's "Recreations" column in SciAm ... had me racing to my C=64 to cobbling together imaginary math routines using assembler, making BIOS calls. Which brings me to my point: does anybody even /grok/ assembler anymore? Or *heaven forbid* ML? Rereading your post reminded me of Ilya Prigogine’s book on chaos theory … surprisingly readable. And that reminded me of 1985 with Martin Gardiner’s “Recreations” column in SciAm … had me racing to my C=64 to cobbling together imaginary math routines using assembler, making BIOS calls. Which brings me to my point: does anybody even /grok/ assembler anymore? Or *heaven forbid* ML?

]]> By: Ned Henry http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/comment-page-1/#comment-1513 Ned Henry Mon, 17 Dec 2007 23:21:31 +0000 http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/#comment-1513 Even when I was little, while I was learning in school the aforementioned stacking method, I found myself adding or subtracting the columns on the left first. The only times it has seemed slower are when the numbers are in the millions or above and when three or more entries are involved. I don't think it's that unusual. I think it's actually more natural. Indeed, I asked a couple of my friends, and they do it the same way. I agree with Ben. I think the autistic savants (the preferred term for idiot savants, per the referenced DSM-IV and forthcoming DSM-V) are able to compute on a much more complex level. Straightforward addition and subtraction are not on this level. Simply notice that when you switch from addition to multi-digit multiplication you can no longer operate from left to right. There are other interesting short-cuts I find myself performing with multiplication and division, such as separating the columns for one of the two numbers and then bringing the products back together. I'm sure others with average mathematical skills like mine perform similar tasks, but to the savants, such an operation is child's play. Even when I was little, while I was learning in school the aforementioned stacking method, I found myself adding or subtracting the columns on the left first. The only times it has seemed slower are when the numbers are in the millions or above and when three or more entries are involved. I don’t think it’s that unusual. I think it’s actually more natural. Indeed, I asked a couple of my friends, and they do it the same way.

I agree with Ben. I think the autistic savants (the preferred term for idiot savants, per the referenced DSM-IV and forthcoming DSM-V) are able to compute on a much more complex level. Straightforward addition and subtraction are not on this level. Simply notice that when you switch from addition to multi-digit multiplication you can no longer operate from left to right.

There are other interesting short-cuts I find myself performing with multiplication and division, such as separating the columns for one of the two numbers and then bringing the products back together. I’m sure others with average mathematical skills like mine perform similar tasks, but to the savants, such an operation is child’s play.

]]> By: Ben Tremblay http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/comment-page-1/#comment-1462 Ben Tremblay Sat, 08 Dec 2007 02:20:54 +0000 http://skeltoac.com/2007/12/06/carry-the-one/#comment-1462 Dunno, but ... like the folk who can find day of week for any date? (Coincidentally, the first algo we were asked to write in our APL course. I'm old ... don't ask.) Seems to me those are conceptually different from folk who can deal with transcendental functions. I mean ... those have a grasp of math and can prolly explicate their reasoning (read: the dreaded "Show your work" metric.) while the former get the answers to problems that are more arithmetic than math and likely can't explicate it at all. Just a thot ... I groked lasers in grade 3 but flunked math in grade 10 cuz of quadratic equations. *shrug* Dunno, but … like the folk who can find day of week for any date? (Coincidentally, the first algo we were asked to write in our APL course. I’m old … don’t ask.) Seems to me those are conceptually different from folk who can deal with transcendental functions. I mean … those have a grasp of math and can prolly explicate their reasoning (read: the dreaded “Show your work” metric.) while the former get the answers to problems that are more arithmetic than math and likely can’t explicate it at all.
Just a thot … I groked lasers in grade 3 but flunked math in grade 10 cuz of quadratic equations. *shrug*

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