It's the 100th episode of Tech Support! Thanks everyone! Check out the rest of the series here: ua-cam.com/play/PLibNZv5Zd0dwIx8baZGDdkoPNg6LHAPDi.html
I'm sorry but Pro. Moon Duchin, hands down WINS 'Best Professor Name in the Whole World' award!😘💕 EDIT: After watching this whole video, Pro. Moon Duchin is now _my,_ "If you could take just one person to lunch, living or dead, who would it be?" her, it'd be her. I could teach her about decorating & design, the lunch could last days. I'm all for that.😂😂😂
"I'm professor Moon Duchin, comma, mathematician." It's not even a math joke, but it is such a thing a mathematician would say. I'm sold, this woman is legit.
@@anplusdre While definitely very difficult to obtain, it's still just a title that doesn't necessarily mean the person holding it is rational or wise. Or that they haven't fallen for weird ideas later in life. There are Nobel Prize winners who are now shilling for all kinds of insane woo.
As a math major I love seeing people express what makes math exciting. We take ‘simple’ concepts like the number zero and poke holes in it. Things fall apart. Things get ugly. But then we manage to find even more profound and elegant concepts in the scraps! It’s a very beautiful and liberating experience.
I've never been able to grasp the creative aspect of math and the elegance that comes with it,maybe its because ive never taken higher math classes in college.Math is nothing for me but a tool to understand the workings of universe, as a physics major leaning to experimental side of things...
Yea that’s the thing . I love mathematics and beauty of it . But I can say this without hesitation that in school , people are provided with sums that involve just plugging numbers and no creativity .
I don’t know about physics a lot but as the famous saying goes a mathematician is a guy searching for a black cat in a dark room which isn’t even there !
this is my professor, and they were amazing. I really, really dreaded taking a math class, but honestly their class was so interesting. moon explains things so well. I went to office hours a couple of times and was always blown away by how smart and cool they are. So brilliant and also able to boil things down to my level.
As someone who recently got their BSc in Math, I loved every second of this video. Professor Moon Duchin is so passionate, I envy the students who got her as their professor. I think the main FAQ I hear about math is “When will I need this in my life?” The simple answer to the majority of it is that you do not, but that rather it’s the opportunity to think logically, problem solve, and critically think and examine that you do need in your everyday life.
to add on, I often like to compare mathematics to art. Though it can be "useful", being useful is not the point, it's point/purpose can be its inherent beauty
@@mikeearls126 man if I tell you some cheese is "melty" you know exactly what texture it is. second of all her doctorate is in math, not english. find something more important to worry about fr
When she talked about how ppl in math don't/can't explain their subject matter enough to the public, I felt it in my soul. When I was young, I really liked math, I felt like I understood it and could be proud of it, I even wanted to be a mathematician, it was a time when explanations made sense and weren't a handful of unintelligible(to me) jargon that had me stopping every 5 minutes asking for a more precise description. As that kept happening, repeatedly, where I constantly asked my teachers and felt like I was inconveniencing everybody, I eventually stopped asking for an explanation, stopped feeling curiosity, and steadily lost my love for math. It felt like the silent breakup couples have, you don't say it upfront, but you know there's a distance, and the boat to cross it had sunk deep down.
i love how she describes math as pretty it humanises it. math is seen as so cold and objective but what coldness can there be in something that is used to explain the nature of the universe purely out of curiousity and passion?
@@epicmorphism2240 The barely knowing it is what caused me massive grief. I can do the basics easily and taxes/budgets aren't an issue. But you get to calculus and trigonometry and that's where the hate lies. For good reason. Not all of which is maths fault.
Very cool! Definitely try to invite her on again, really like how she explains stuff. Doing a "5 Levels of" for math would be difficult but if anyone can do that, she can.
I was never very good at math, but I can’t tell you how mesmerizing it is to listen to and watch someone who is so passionate about the subject explain it. There really aren’t words to describe it
I'm a mathematics student now, and in all honesty, I'd much rather be an average mathematician but have this ability to communicate what I do and why I do it, than be the next Euler or Gauss. A groundbreaking mathematical proof is no good if you can't explain to the public why you care about it and why they should too. It's people like this that inspire kids to become mathematicians.
There's a big difference in failing to explain a groundbreaking mathematical proof to fellow mathematicians and failing to explain it to public. A groundbreaking proof may not be good if you can't explain it to mathematicians but it's still very good if the general public can't grasp it. Unless you're saying that, say the proof of Fundamental theorem of algebra by complex analysis, isn't good because the general public won't be able to understand it.
@@MightyDoomerChannel Nooooo. I disagree, that is not quite true. I had a lot of average teachers, just applying the methods they learned, lousy ones who should have never gone onto teaching, and a few ones who just have a way, they manage to make you understand stuff. Not everybody can do that. Age wise there is a difference too. I had college professor swearing they could never teach anywhere but college.
@@sidoniemany2339 when a person teaches the other, he teaches it the same way he learnt it. You must have seen teachers giving out tricks on how to remember something, because that's how they remembered it. Now someone who's uninterested in teaching or someone who has forgotten the ways he learnt it or someone who is jealous of his own students won't be able to teach.
I HATE math, but I LOVED this video, this professor is amazingly passionate, well-spoken, and allowed me to think something I NEVER thought I would or ever could, she made math interesting. We’ll done professor, we’ll done!
The right teacher is the answer. In school i hated math. Always failed to understand felt myself so stupid and classes was so boring. But in university i began to love math yet i still bad at it. It's like magic behind ordinary world.
Don't hate math because if you really want to use it, it may hate you. Just ignore the subject and throw it to the corner of your mind. When you peobably have interest or can rationalize using different angle maybe it is your time then as euler or whoever historical figure you want to be.
I highly agree with the part "We're really bad at telling people what we are doing" 🤣 I often see these experts explaining in 5 levels like to a 5yr old, to a teenager, yeah I can never do that lol!
@@chenjohnson2787 that's only true if we've got enough time tho. You can't oversimplify really complex topics without giving the student basics, which might take time.
@@chenjohnson2787 Understanding something means someone is educated but failing to explain does not classify if you understand it or not. Someone can be educated but not a good explainer. Like i am, idk what im saying but what at best try to say is that, everyone can excel in one or two but not getting a perfect match number does not classify you as uneducated or someone with lack of understanding. We have limitation on what we can do best and not everyone is the same. And not mention, a pastor's job of teaching is easier than math, thats why not everything is easy to explain that some can't just do it
I appreciate her approach of bringing up lesser known and historically underrepresented people for her answer of "who is the greatest mathematician," but I wanted to add what is the "traditional" answer to that question, that being Leonhard Euler. There's a joke in the math community that things in math are named after the first person to discover it after Euler; otherwise everything would be named for Euler.
And don't forget Gauss. As a Math college student, I loved those two guys until everything was named after them, everything they discovered was difficult, and I started getting annoyed by Gauss and Euler
What I like about this video, is that the professor doesn't answer the questions directly, but rather addresses the reason for the question, which ends up being a lot more informative. For instance, the "times before plus question" could be easily answered by saying that it doesn't matter, since whatever choice you make you can still use brackets to express anything you want. But that is not a helpful answer, so the explanation given in the video talking about the "rules of mathematics" is much more illuminating. Like the comparison with chess too.
I feel like if I had math teachers like this, I would have ended up way more interested in math and way more confident! LOVE the experts you find for these
“You can think of pi like this if you’re allergic to circles” 💀 Real talk, math major here. This woman is a true mathematician because she knows that not all mathematicians process the same concepts in the same ways. Some people need to be able to associate a concept with a shape i.e. draw it out, where as others can think of things numerically i.e equations and power series. So rad. So math.
After so many years, I'm convinced the problem of mathematics being considered hard/boring isn't mathematics itself, but how THEY TEACH them. I suffered with maths throughout elementary and middle school. It was a nightmare. But then a wonderful teacher at high school, who didn't mind bringing a huge case (literally, she carried it everyday like it was her sword and shield) full of all sorts of stuff, made my generation fell in love with maths. Everything was "going back to basics" as part of the last segment of her class: she then opened her _magic case_ and took out bottle caps, cords, pieces of wood, marbles, sticks, chains, plastic cups, dominoes, little dolls, action figures, old coins. Anything served. She then said "if you can _manipulate_ maths, and I mean touch them, see them, even smell them... it'll be easier. Trust me". We were a bit reluctant and mistrustful the first week. I confess I even thought what kind of drugs did she take on a regular basis. But oh man, I was wrong. Not only it was fun and relaxing to start doing math problems with all that stuff, but in a very prodigious way... she fixed the awful void I was been carrying all my life, regarding maths. I'm being honest: I finally understood fractions (in its formal meaning) until I was 16. How she made it? We formed a percussionist enssemble (we were horrible, but it was fun) with her as our conductor, using our hands, sticks and cups as musical instruments. We then analyzed time signatures and the magic was WE WERE ABLE TO HEAR THE FRACTIONS AND WE COULD PLAY WITH THEM! I'll never forget the class reaction. It was that beautiful moment of mind clearness. And then... you smile. She was the best teacher I ever had. Always full of energy, enthusiasm, new ideas and good humor. She loved her profession and she made us love maths. She passed away in 2015. I miss her so much. I bet she's still teaching maths in heaven. Of course, with the aid of her huge magic case. Oh boy. A big thanks to all math teachers who are always in the pursuit of new ways of teaching and also think about their student needs.
13:47 The most commonly asked question, "when will we ever use this?" We will either have to come up with a better response or change the material we teach.
It kind of makes a false assumption about the nature of education. Like, 90 percent of the stuff people learn in school they never "use", yet people only love to throw that cliche around regarding math. General knowledge and mind expansion is just as important as applicable skills, and that's what pre college education is for. The applicable skills part of education is what college is for.
“They spelled it algorhythm… I like it, I’m gonna keep it” - the world’s coolest mathematician. Also, as a Classicist/Philosopher, we also looovvveee real blackboards. There is nothing quite like the satisfaction of finishing an enormous irregular Latin declension chart or determining a complex argument is valid with a massive truth table on a real blackboard with chalk. I’m honestly just trying to find things in common with Professor Duchin because I love her.
not a math fan myself, but watching Moon Duchin speak with such a passion made me so curious about math. I would love to have a teacher as great as her :3
Math is so cool after you finally have a grasp on it. You’ll see it everywhere and it’ll blow your mind how entire fields of math are all based around a simple clever idea.
Yeah…I will probably never have a full grasp on math with my learning disability being so selective lol but I have a deep love for science and reading.
I don't know where Wired finds the people for this series! But once again, another absolute gem. Moon sounds like the kind of teacher everyone needs to experience at least once in their life: someone whose enthusiasm for their field of study is contagious.
Maths is the language in which science is written. Maths and science are entirely different. I know many fellow maths majors of mine who hate physics and chemistry but are die hard math fanatics.
Japanese chalk? Yep, that's def Hagoromo chalk haha. Although I'm an econ student, I love this chalk. First learned about it on my first year in a Japanese university. Even my finance prof loves it so much he told us everything about the chalk once during a short break in his lecture. Kept on going and on about it. We were all raptured by it btw haha
I took linear algebra recently and you really don’t get why seemingly useless things like imaginary numbers are incredibly important until you have to think about matrices. Wish there was a more intuitive way to express these concepts to kids, but math really is very abstract. Also: a little sad that she didn’t choose Euler for the sexiest equation, but that’s alright. Minsky looks very cool.
agreed, When I was in music theory I was like "bruh this is just math and a foreign language in one" im assuming they meant the theory itself since rhythms are just math. dividing and subdivisions upon subdivisions so I totally get that. math is definitely involved but its not just math. GREAT VIDEO! Duchin seems like a lovely person and I love her shirt! as a musician I always used to think that the arts were the most creative and imaginative place to be but I love these wired videos because it goes to show just how artistic and creative many other things can be. the way she describes and loves math sounds like the passion and imagination and creation that goes into music. its great
Math had always been kinda hard for me, especially calculus. Then this one year, after I had to redo my year at high school, there was this teacher who was really good at explaining things and why I do things in order to get certain results, that opened my eyes and made me fall in love with math instantly. Graduated with a 9.43(Dutch grading system) which was two hundredth short to finish with a perfect 10. I had an average of 4.3(5.5 is the very minimum you have to get to pass) the year I had to redo.
WIRED + Prof. Moon = 100thEPISODEMASTERPIECE 🤩 The elegant and passionate way Moon speaks about such a complicated specialty topic is astounding and yet I don’t feel patronised in the least! Thank you for the best collaboration on UA-cam!🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻
The Japanese people get so many things right. I'm obsessed with Japanese culture and people and am thrilled that my Son, at some point in the future, is taking me there.
@@JaniceWithTheTarlovCyst ~ i saw your username… i was wondering if i could ask you some questions, please?? do you have severe nerve pain? if so, how you deal with it. i have many health problems myself. ménières disease + fibromyalgia being the most debilitating. i have seen so many doctors + specialist, waiting to see another specialist in july. but it seems like my doctors thus far are not helpful enough. btw, i am a bit of a weeaboo myself. my bff is about to move back to japan again. which will be so nice for having not only a place to stay, but a tour guide as well. best wishes to you + your health!
I have a question for Dr. Moon Duchin : is maths artificial or natural ? Or to be more specific, does maths existe only in the minds of human race or does it existe already, and mathematicians are only trying to discover it, like physicists trying to learn about the universe?
No her, obviously, but here's my take: math simply describes relationships between things, and so is natural. That is, nature operates according to some rules, and we developed a set of symbols and rules to describe these rules. It really depends on what you mean by artificial. Is it the same as "man-made"? Because if so, the answer is even more resounding - math isn't man-made; many animals are capable of counting, for example, and the brain consists of networks of neurons that are continuously performing mathematical operations in order to process the signals it gets form the outside world.
This was really well explained, it’s always lovely when someone can talk about a topic in simple enough terms that you walk away feeling like you understood.
Do you know that what is the defference between mathematician and. Physicist , Physicist do lots of mathematics but they only see it's application but mathematician are defferent they care less about application and more about beauty because they are searching for truth.
If I had a teacher like her back in school, I would’ve loved math. I admire people who are just so insanely smart and can do this complex math with ease. It’s always been an envy of mine. This professor is awesome, I’m glad you shared her on here!
Right? I had a linguistics professor who described a language I don't remember as "easy, like Sanskrit", and she meant it. Insane what some people are capable of.
Props to the mathematician that gives interesting and insightful answers to many abysmal questions. Props to those who formulate interesting questions too!
7:08 She actually didn't describe what Pi is but described the application of Pi. Pi is just the ratio of a circle's circumference over its diameter. You can actually do the experiment yourself. Take any size of circle with its center known. Measure the diameter. Then measure the circumference of said circle by using rope. If you divide the circumference by the diameter, you'll get a number approximately equal to Pi.
its often associated with that bc thats usually the only thing people know about it: p=2πr. But π isnt that, its not JUST that. For example it also linking the Planck's constant with its reduced form: h=2πℏ
Yeah that bothered me too. It's such an easy response and by not saying it, she made it sound as though it were too complicated to explain on the spot.
@@kamilbxl6 I agree, but I think she could have said something like "right off the bat, here's one straightforward way to think about it." And then go into more depth. A concept being deep doesn't mean we can't also have a tangible way to think about it.
as a physics enthusiast, I screamed "Noooo! You need it everyday!" The beautiful concept of simplifying. Look at a convoluted mess, take little parts of it and rearrange them until they are in a form you're able to understand more easily but it is still the same. All by having a set of rules to do so, invented by mathematicians. That exact equation though.... yeah, definitely never.
props to whoever has to condense what the expert said into a whatever character count tweet, it always makes me anxious when they talk a bunch and I can't imagine a proper way of synthesizing the info.
I would so register for all of professor Moon's courses. She's got a teaching style that I wish more mathematicians have. It's her "bedside manner" that sets her apart. I promise!
15:20 DUUUUUUUUUUUUDE omg Moon Duchin you made me so happy when you mentioned Noether. I have been studying a lot of regular rings and rings which are essentially of finite type over a field lately (also DVR's, which iirc, under some conditions at least, a Noetherian valuation ring is a DVR, since you have valuation ideals (I don't remember what the conditions are off the top of my head) ) so this made me really happy.
Did I understand even half of what she was saying? No. But did I enjoy watching this and hearing her speak so passionately about it? Yes! 10/10 bring her back again!
This is by far the most overwhelming Tech Support video. Everything else is beautiful comprehensible. Some of these equations just lost me. Like, "wtf is she talking about" This has never happened with absorbing information before, but some of these equations are just mind-boggling.
Yeah I could’ve told you Moon was a mathematician immediately without ever hearing a word of math in this video. The vibes are so mathematician-y. Also apparently my analysis professor, Alex Eskin, was Moon’s doctoral advisor, which is neat. Facts that everyone in math loves chalkboards and hagoromo
I'm so mad! If I had someone in my life who explained math concepts like Prof. Duchin I wouldn't have been nearly as miserable. The whole part about mathematicians multiplying shapes made me really curious. I had no idea math in general had all this space for exploring and curiosity, I always thought of it (only) as a way to explain what already is and a secret list of rules or language for the stuff most ppl don't have to worry about. Well, I'm glad the good Prof exists and is helping more ppl even if it's too late for me 😅👵🏾
"mainstream" math if i can call it that seems to be as you say only one way to explain things, but thats cause those are the very basics. It feels rigid because those are the basic rules, kinda like learning the letter of the alphabet, but the deeper you dive into maths, it gets very crazy, very specific and very creative
With regards to arithmetic's order of operations, it's just convention. You can't have a world where 2+2*2 is sometimes 8 and sometimes 6. We all need to be on the same page on what that expression means, otherwise things go very wrong very quickly.. Anyone remember when a NASA rocket exploded when some engineers used metric measurements and some used imperial? Yikes. Best to all just agree that multiplication comes before addition so 2+2*2 always equals 6. (there's no inherent reason for multiplication before addiction, it's just what was decided).
I disagree. There is a good reason to put multiplication before addition. Fundamental things like linear combinations and polynomials would get a lot worse to write otherwise.
@@diribigal exactly, there is a reason for multiplication before addiction and it was also explained in the video. Without it a lot of mathematics would be way more difficult to represent
I realize I’m late to this party, but I just wanted to add my admiration for Prof. Duchin to the pile. I got to the end of the video and felt genuine regret that I’d never had a math professor like this, because I felt like if I had I might have gone into math academia and loved it. Thanks for spreading your passion in such an accessible way! :)
This was my first viewing of this series. I am quite flabbergasted and impressed. I liked the way(s) you defined imaginary numbers and Zero. That always perplexed me. Thank you.
For those who are commenting about how Indians invented zero and not Mayans, she's not taking about the symbol "0" itself, she's talking about the CONCEPT OF ZERO (that was asked in twitter) which already existed before the symbol "0". She literally talks about how different civilizations developed their methods (one of them being Indians who invented the symbol "0" that we use now) of using the concept in numbering.
@@altuber99_athlete Given a commutative ring with 1, we can localize that ring by any of its prime ideals. In particular, localizing an integral domain by the 0 ideal produces its quotient field. Here, our ring is the integers, which we localize at 0 ideal, giving the field of rational numbers aka the usual fractions.
My favorite person who had a hand in math was archimedes because he invented a device called the archimedes screw which we still use for irrigation and sewage treatment plants today, and he is also credited with creating statistics
I saw a youtube about Fulltouch chalk, by Hagoromo Stationery in Nagoya, Japan. Funny to see her mentioning it (well probably). The factor was going to shut down and in 2015 mathematicians starting hoarding it. Shin Hyeong-seok, a teacher in Korea, then took over manufacturing it and basically saved the minds of lots of math people.
I don’t agree with the answer to “when am I ever going to need this?”. The OP may never need to solve this exact question but the ability to learn the abstractions and methods of solving problems will definitely be needed.
One aspect that would have greatly helped me, with learning Math, as a kid; if somebody would have given it context. We learned it 'because subject / we do'. Understanding that it is essentially an agreed language, for solving problems would have given it a lot more sense, to me. Like many languages, there are often many ways to say the same thing.
Thank you for making math interesting! I have a love/hate with numbers outside of my career in accounting/bookkeeping thanks to grade school teachers just writing on a board and expecting us to copy and learn. Maybe if I had someone enthusiastic teaching mathematics, it wouldn't have seemed so difficult and boring. You're amazing!
As a mathematician, I agree with every single answer Prof. Duchin gave, except for the sexiet equation question, but that it's just a matter of taste (aka field of expertise).
The "explaining the joke" wisdom doesnt generally apply for language learning/teaching cultures. If youre teaching English or learning mandarin or whatever, explaining the joke is usually the way to make it funny.
It's the 100th episode of Tech Support! Thanks everyone! Check out the rest of the series here: ua-cam.com/play/PLibNZv5Zd0dwIx8baZGDdkoPNg6LHAPDi.html
@@Digitalhunny I was going to say something similar 😅
You're 100% correct
WHERE is the information to find Professor Moon Duchin, Mathematician located??🤔🤞
I'm sorry but Pro. Moon Duchin, hands down WINS 'Best Professor Name in the Whole World' award!😘💕
EDIT: After watching this whole video, Pro. Moon Duchin is now _my,_ "If you could take just one person to lunch, living or dead, who would it be?" her, it'd be her. I could teach her about decorating & design, the lunch could last days. I'm all for that.😂😂😂
I love the series! I'd really like to see a philosophy support episode :)
lol
"I'm professor Moon Duchin, comma, mathematician."
It's not even a math joke, but it is such a thing a mathematician would say. I'm sold, this woman is legit.
It's something that someone autistic would say.
ALSO WHAT A BADASS NAME.
Any professor is legit bro
@@anplusdre While definitely very difficult to obtain, it's still just a title that doesn't necessarily mean the person holding it is rational or wise. Or that they haven't fallen for weird ideas later in life. There are Nobel Prize winners who are now shilling for all kinds of insane woo.
> ALSO WHAT A BADASS NAME.
Plot twist: Duchin is the Persian word for moon. Her name is literally "Moon Moon."
(Fortunately, it's not. I made it up.)
As a math major I love seeing people express what makes math exciting. We take ‘simple’ concepts like the number zero and poke holes in it. Things fall apart. Things get ugly. But then we manage to find even more profound and elegant concepts in the scraps! It’s a very beautiful and liberating experience.
chicken sandwich
ohh no wonder 0 is a donut y'all poked too many holes in the little guy
I've never been able to grasp the creative aspect of math and the elegance that comes with it,maybe its because ive never taken higher math classes in college.Math is nothing for me but a tool to understand the workings of universe, as a physics major leaning to experimental side of things...
Yea that’s the thing . I love mathematics and beauty of it . But I can say this without hesitation that in school , people are provided with sums that involve just plugging numbers and no creativity .
I don’t know about physics a lot but as the famous saying goes a mathematician is a guy searching for a black cat in a dark room which isn’t even there !
this is my professor, and they were amazing. I really, really dreaded taking a math class, but honestly their class was so interesting. moon explains things so well. I went to office hours a couple of times and was always blown away by how smart and cool they are. So brilliant and also able to boil things down to my level.
Definitely not an English major!
@@lf2334 lol.
@@nicholegallo1090 can we have babies?
This paragraph is grammatically confusing.
@@1865Highst No, it’s not- maybe brush up on your reading skills?
As a mathematician, I cannot express how real the love of chalkboard is real AF.
ratio
why do you use chalkboards and not whiteboards? I'd imagine that whiteboards are less messy
@@hurricane3518 look up hagoromo chalk
@@hurricane3518 She explaind why, rewatch the chalkboard part. She made me want to buy a chalkboard and chalk 🥰
As a student with allergy and has to actively seek back bench for all the classes ...... ha... ha... hachooo (sneeze)!
Imagine if they do a "politician explains politics"
The questions gonna be very interesting😂
I think I need this
@@jairocampo1992 we ALL need this!
Yoooo you may have cracked the code
I support this concept
@@sitaraghosh6159 I second that notion!!
As someone who recently got their BSc in Math, I loved every second of this video. Professor Moon Duchin is so passionate, I envy the students who got her as their professor.
I think the main FAQ I hear about math is “When will I need this in my life?” The simple answer to the majority of it is that you do not, but that rather it’s the opportunity to think logically, problem solve, and critically think and examine that you do need in your everyday life.
e
Exactly. My answer to my Algebra 1 and Geometry students every time.
to add on,
I often like to compare mathematics to art.
Though it can be "useful", being useful is not the point, it's point/purpose can be its inherent beauty
Plus there were a lot of instances when some areas of maths werent useful yet
did you get a good job with that bachelor, asking cuz im in that road too, thanks in advance
"Is it number-y." Perfect, incredible, I love this woman.
"were gonna do it every time, we cant be stopped" protect her at all costs
chicken sandwich
i hate when people make up words like this...numbery? it's like melty. melty is not a word.
Its like the verbification of nouns....."no one out pizzas the hut" Pizza is not a verb
@@mikeearls126 man if I tell you some cheese is "melty" you know exactly what texture it is. second of all her doctorate is in math, not english. find something more important to worry about fr
When she talked about how ppl in math don't/can't explain their subject matter enough to the public, I felt it in my soul. When I was young, I really liked math, I felt like I understood it and could be proud of it, I even wanted to be a mathematician, it was a time when explanations made sense and weren't a handful of unintelligible(to me) jargon that had me stopping every 5 minutes asking for a more precise description. As that kept happening, repeatedly, where I constantly asked my teachers and felt like I was inconveniencing everybody, I eventually stopped asking for an explanation, stopped feeling curiosity, and steadily lost my love for math. It felt like the silent breakup couples have, you don't say it upfront, but you know there's a distance, and the boat to cross it had sunk deep down.
i love how she describes math as pretty it humanises it. math is seen as so cold and objective but what coldness can there be in something that is used to explain the nature of the universe purely out of curiousity and passion?
Maths is so beautiful
That is very well written.
IKR!!
Stfu, humanises it? Gtfo
It hits me in the face if i get it wrong and call me a stupid idiot
What a great teacher! I almost understood everything she said, and I hate math.
Hey :D ! I know some of those words!
how can you hate something you don‘t know
@@epicmorphism2240 Easy. People do it all the time. 😂
@@epicmorphism2240 The barely knowing it is what caused me massive grief. I can do the basics easily and taxes/budgets aren't an issue. But you get to calculus and trigonometry and that's where the hate lies. For good reason. Not all of which is maths fault.
@@pingidjit yea but trigonometry and other function is also super important for engineering and physicist
“We didn’t have to do it, but it’s pretty”
Mathematics in a nutshell XD
Very cool person! Glad Wired is bringing all of these experts for us to learn
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh Tomato soup
I didn't under a lot in it 😆
@@Daisika grilled banana
@@tarudo923 bornana
Very cool! Definitely try to invite her on again, really like how she explains stuff. Doing a "5 Levels of" for math would be difficult but if anyone can do that, she can.
I believe Moon uses they/them not she/her
@@greekejones8406 nobody gives a flying feck🖖🏻
I was never very good at math, but I can’t tell you how mesmerizing it is to listen to and watch someone who is so passionate about the subject explain it. There really aren’t words to describe it
I'm a mathematics student now, and in all honesty, I'd much rather be an average mathematician but have this ability to communicate what I do and why I do it, than be the next Euler or Gauss. A groundbreaking mathematical proof is no good if you can't explain to the public why you care about it and why they should too. It's people like this that inspire kids to become mathematicians.
As a theorist I want to disagree with you but as a mathematician I have to agree with the last part.
Ok then. I’ll be the gauss
There's a big difference in failing to explain a groundbreaking mathematical proof to fellow mathematicians and failing to explain it to public. A groundbreaking proof may not be good if you can't explain it to mathematicians but it's still very good if the general public can't grasp it. Unless you're saying that, say the proof of Fundamental theorem of algebra by complex analysis, isn't good because the general public won't be able to understand it.
Aint her ability to communicate is relevant to her being not-your-average-mathematician tho?
For inspiring kids, this is why math teachers are important imo. They are the first ppl to expose kids to math.
The way she is explaining those complicated topics is impressive.
It goes to show that she really understands what she has learned
Anyone who really understood a topic is capable of explaining it like to a ten years old
@@MightyDoomerChannel Nooooo. I disagree, that is not quite true. I had a lot of average teachers, just applying the methods they learned, lousy ones who should have never gone onto teaching, and a few ones who just have a way, they manage to make you understand stuff. Not everybody can do that. Age wise there is a difference too. I had college professor swearing they could never teach anywhere but college.
@@sidoniemany2339 when a person teaches the other, he teaches it the same way he learnt it.
You must have seen teachers giving out tricks on how to remember something, because that's how they remembered it.
Now someone who's uninterested in teaching or someone who has forgotten the ways he learnt it or someone who is jealous of his own students won't be able to teach.
I HATE math, but I LOVED this video, this professor is amazingly passionate, well-spoken, and allowed me to think something I NEVER thought I would or ever could, she made math interesting. We’ll done professor, we’ll done!
You just had bad teachers.
I never liked doing math but she just sparked interst and curiosity in my mind, she is amazing
The right teacher is the answer.
In school i hated math. Always failed to understand felt myself so stupid and classes was so boring.
But in university i began to love math yet i still bad at it.
It's like magic behind ordinary world.
We are on the same boat person! That's exactly it xD!
Don't hate math because if you really want to use it, it may hate you. Just ignore the subject and throw it to the corner of your mind. When you peobably have interest or can rationalize using different angle maybe it is your time then as euler or whoever historical figure you want to be.
I highly agree with the part "We're really bad at telling people what we are doing" 🤣 I often see these experts explaining in 5 levels like to a 5yr old, to a teenager, yeah I can never do that lol!
chicken sandwich
"If you can't explain it to a kid, you don't fully understand it." - A pastor I once knew. Oddly enough.
@@chenjohnson2787 that's only true if we've got enough time tho. You can't oversimplify really complex topics without giving the student basics, which might take time.
@@adamgillespie3393 facts!!
@@chenjohnson2787 Understanding something means someone is educated but failing to explain does not classify if you understand it or not. Someone can be educated but not a good explainer. Like i am, idk what im saying but what at best try to say is that, everyone can excel in one or two but not getting a perfect match number does not classify you as uneducated or someone with lack of understanding. We have limitation on what we can do best and not everyone is the same. And not mention, a pastor's job of teaching is easier than math, thats why not everything is easy to explain that some can't just do it
If those Pringles are real I admire the way she didn't reach for one every 10 seconds.
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh I like eating human flesh
@@N____er i prefer ham and cheese
Lmao honestly tho 😂
Yea if it were me. I'll take those Pringles chips and eat it
This mathematician should have a youtube channel
Thank you wired for having a mathematician on. As a fellow math major this was a fun episode.
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh Sammich
I appreciate her approach of bringing up lesser known and historically underrepresented people for her answer of "who is the greatest mathematician," but I wanted to add what is the "traditional" answer to that question, that being Leonhard Euler. There's a joke in the math community that things in math are named after the first person to discover it after Euler; otherwise everything would be named for Euler.
chicken sandwich
And don't forget Gauss. As a Math college student, I loved those two guys until everything was named after them, everything they discovered was difficult, and I started getting annoyed by Gauss and Euler
I think L'Hopital is the greatest mathematician for not discovering L'Hopital's rule
@@CAG2 beautiful. Love the reasoning.
Him or Gauss
What I like about this video, is that the professor doesn't answer the questions directly, but rather addresses the reason for the question, which ends up being a lot more informative. For instance, the "times before plus question" could be easily answered by saying that it doesn't matter, since whatever choice you make you can still use brackets to express anything you want. But that is not a helpful answer, so the explanation given in the video talking about the "rules of mathematics" is much more illuminating. Like the comparison with chess too.
She looks like she would be a nice teacher.
Right? First thing I thought was, oh she is so wholesome
chicken sandwich
Ok
I mean she is a teacher…
I feel like if I had math teachers like this, I would have ended up way more interested in math and way more confident! LOVE the experts you find for these
How did your math teachers teach?
“You can think of pi like this if you’re allergic to circles” 💀
Real talk, math major here. This woman is a true mathematician because she knows that not all mathematicians process the same concepts in the same ways. Some people need to be able to associate a concept with a shape i.e. draw it out, where as others can think of things numerically i.e equations and power series. So rad. So math.
Teaching math without the physical phenomena they represent is like teaching literature without ever teaching grammar.
Tao's analysis book defines π as the smallest positive root of sin(x) lol
@@user_2793 It is usually defined that way in analysis
chicken sandwich
yea, it's really radians
After so many years, I'm convinced the problem of mathematics being considered hard/boring isn't mathematics itself, but how THEY TEACH them.
I suffered with maths throughout elementary and middle school. It was a nightmare. But then a wonderful teacher at high school, who didn't mind bringing a huge case (literally, she carried it everyday like it was her sword and shield) full of all sorts of stuff, made my generation fell in love with maths. Everything was "going back to basics" as part of the last segment of her class: she then opened her _magic case_ and took out bottle caps, cords, pieces of wood, marbles, sticks, chains, plastic cups, dominoes, little dolls, action figures, old coins. Anything served.
She then said "if you can _manipulate_ maths, and I mean touch them, see them, even smell them... it'll be easier. Trust me". We were a bit reluctant and mistrustful the first week. I confess I even thought what kind of drugs did she take on a regular basis. But oh man, I was wrong. Not only it was fun and relaxing to start doing math problems with all that stuff, but in a very prodigious way... she fixed the awful void I was been carrying all my life, regarding maths. I'm being honest: I finally understood fractions (in its formal meaning) until I was 16. How she made it? We formed a percussionist enssemble (we were horrible, but it was fun) with her as our conductor, using our hands, sticks and cups as musical instruments. We then analyzed time signatures and the magic was WE WERE ABLE TO HEAR THE FRACTIONS AND WE COULD PLAY WITH THEM! I'll never forget the class reaction. It was that beautiful moment of mind clearness. And then... you smile.
She was the best teacher I ever had. Always full of energy, enthusiasm, new ideas and good humor. She loved her profession and she made us love maths.
She passed away in 2015. I miss her so much. I bet she's still teaching maths in heaven. Of course, with the aid of her huge magic case. Oh boy.
A big thanks to all math teachers who are always in the pursuit of new ways of teaching and also think about their student needs.
13:47 The most commonly asked question, "when will we ever use this?"
We will either have to come up with a better response or change the material we teach.
It kind of makes a false assumption about the nature of education. Like, 90 percent of the stuff people learn in school they never "use", yet people only love to throw that cliche around regarding math. General knowledge and mind expansion is just as important as applicable skills, and that's what pre college education is for. The applicable skills part of education is what college is for.
@@phyein4815 agreed, doing math improves problem solving skills
@Phyein Amazing response. Solid point there.
@@WestExplainsBest This but unironically.
@@phyein4815 wow u explained it so perfectly
“They spelled it algorhythm… I like it, I’m gonna keep it” - the world’s coolest mathematician. Also, as a Classicist/Philosopher, we also looovvveee real blackboards. There is nothing quite like the satisfaction of finishing an enormous irregular Latin declension chart or determining a complex argument is valid with a massive truth table on a real blackboard with chalk. I’m honestly just trying to find things in common with Professor Duchin because I love her.
Truth tables = cringe
@@pablobear4241 This statement is not a tautology.
not a math fan myself, but watching Moon Duchin speak with such a passion made me so curious about math. I would love to have a teacher as great as her :3
Math is so cool after you finally have a grasp on it. You’ll see it everywhere and it’ll blow your mind how entire fields of math are all based around a simple clever idea.
Yeah…I will probably never have a full grasp on math with my learning disability being so selective lol but I have a deep love for science and reading.
@@nicholegallo1090 me too 😅 not understanding math has had a terrible effect on me
🤓🤓🤓🤓🤓
@@nicholegallo1090 don't feel bad I have a learning disability too I'm good at every subject besides math I plan on studying history at University tho
@@glen7137 that’s good!!
I don't know where Wired finds the people for this series! But once again, another absolute gem. Moon sounds like the kind of teacher everyone needs to experience at least once in their life: someone whose enthusiasm for their field of study is contagious.
I love the way she talks about math, you can tell how much she loves it. I love being around people with real passion like that
She makes being a mathematician sound so dope and fun. Science is awesome.
chicken sandwich
Math isn't science entirely.
You mean Physics?
Take that back please
Maths is the language in which science is written. Maths and science are entirely different. I know many fellow maths majors of mine who hate physics and chemistry but are die hard math fanatics.
Japanese chalk? Yep, that's def Hagoromo chalk haha. Although I'm an econ student, I love this chalk. First learned about it on my first year in a Japanese university. Even my finance prof loves it so much he told us everything about the chalk once during a short break in his lecture. Kept on going and on about it. We were all raptured by it btw haha
I need to look into this chalk.
I HATE the feel of chalk. Does it feel like average Joe Chalk?
@@DoctorsSong Not at all
@@FancyGonkBoi Ooo now I want to feel it
all the schools here have those boards in classrooms
I took linear algebra recently and you really don’t get why seemingly useless things like imaginary numbers are incredibly important until you have to think about matrices. Wish there was a more intuitive way to express these concepts to kids, but math really is very abstract.
Also: a little sad that she didn’t choose Euler for the sexiest equation, but that’s alright. Minsky looks very cool.
You know when they are useful when you take engineering or physics.
Imo complex numbers are the most useful when dealing with rotations
agreed, When I was in music theory I was like "bruh this is just math and a foreign language in one" im assuming they meant the theory itself since rhythms are just math. dividing and subdivisions upon subdivisions so I totally get that. math is definitely involved but its not just math. GREAT VIDEO! Duchin seems like a lovely person and I love her shirt! as a musician I always used to think that the arts were the most creative and imaginative place to be but I love these wired videos because it goes to show just how artistic and creative many other things can be. the way she describes and loves math sounds like the passion and imagination and creation that goes into music. its great
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh was it good?
@@Kaice88 fantastic
This was fantastic! I'd love to see Dr. Duchin come back for another round, Wired!
chicken sandwich
Math had always been kinda hard for me, especially calculus. Then this one year, after I had to redo my year at high school, there was this teacher who was really good at explaining things and why I do things in order to get certain results, that opened my eyes and made me fall in love with math instantly. Graduated with a 9.43(Dutch grading system) which was two hundredth short to finish with a perfect 10. I had an average of 4.3(5.5 is the very minimum you have to get to pass) the year I had to redo.
This is so wholesome i love this
WIRED + Prof. Moon = 100thEPISODEMASTERPIECE 🤩
The elegant and passionate way Moon speaks about such a complicated specialty topic is astounding and yet I don’t feel patronised in the least! Thank you for the best collaboration on UA-cam!🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻
chicken sandwich
100%
Hagoromo chalk is legendary, and anyone who prefers dry erase just hasn’t used that sweet sweet Japanese chalk yet
The Japanese people get so many things right. I'm obsessed with Japanese culture and people and am thrilled that my Son, at some point in the future, is taking me there.
@@JaniceWithTheTarlovCyst ~ i saw your username… i was wondering if i could ask you some questions, please??
do you have severe nerve pain? if so, how you deal with it. i have many health problems myself. ménières disease + fibromyalgia being the most debilitating. i have seen so many doctors + specialist, waiting to see another specialist in july. but it seems like my doctors thus far are not helpful enough.
btw, i am a bit of a weeaboo myself. my bff is about to move back to japan again. which will be so nice for having not only a place to stay, but a tour guide as well.
best wishes to you + your health!
Al khwarazmi gave us algorithm. Jaber bin Hayan gave us the word Algebra.
My math teachers have always been boring or harsh so I appreciate this casual and calm way about approaching the topic
I have a question for Dr. Moon Duchin : is maths artificial or natural ? Or to be more specific, does maths existe only in the minds of human race or does it existe already, and mathematicians are only trying to discover it, like physicists trying to learn about the universe?
There's no answer. It's one of the most discussed points in the philosophy of mathematics
No her, obviously, but here's my take: math simply describes relationships between things, and so is natural. That is, nature operates according to some rules, and we developed a set of symbols and rules to describe these rules. It really depends on what you mean by artificial. Is it the same as "man-made"? Because if so, the answer is even more resounding - math isn't man-made; many animals are capable of counting, for example, and the brain consists of networks of neurons that are continuously performing mathematical operations in order to process the signals it gets form the outside world.
Not sure, but my 🐕 dog knows the difference between two and four....! 👍🏼😎✌🏼
That question is more philosophical than mathematical.
@@mostlyokay you are describing math of the
Couldn't understand a thing but really cool how you present it with so much passion!
This was really well explained, it’s always lovely when someone can talk about a topic in simple enough terms that you walk away feeling like you understood.
i was confused throughout the whole video but she was so pleasant and passionate about everything so I kept watching
chicken sandwich
She’s so cool and passionate about what she does! I love how she’s so easy to understand in her explanations :)
Do you know that what is the defference between mathematician and. Physicist ,
Physicist do lots of mathematics but they only see it's application but mathematician are defferent they care less about application and more about beauty because they are searching for truth.
Ummm they are a they not a she okay soooooo get it right
i didnt think id make it to the end of this but the person answering was so awesome I kept watching. Good editing too
chicken sandwich
Great to see someone so passionate & articulate talk about their field.
Based on her knowledge. Her field appears to be algebraically closed.
i love how they explain things
So fascinating, I hope you guys do a chemistry version next!
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh ya mama
no not chemistry organic chemistry is enough already
Lmao she’s such a topologist. Also a great speaker
If I had a teacher like her back in school, I would’ve loved math. I admire people who are just so insanely smart and can do this complex math with ease. It’s always been an envy of mine. This professor is awesome, I’m glad you shared her on here!
Right? I had a linguistics professor who described a language I don't remember as "easy, like Sanskrit", and she meant it. Insane what some people are capable of.
Props to the mathematician that gives interesting and insightful answers to many abysmal questions. Props to those who formulate interesting questions too!
did anything in this make sense to me? no. did i still watch the whole thing? yes.
Objection.
Not all of us like chalkboards.
I prefer whiteboards because I have issues with the feeling of chalk.
7:08 She actually didn't describe what Pi is but described the application of Pi. Pi is just the ratio of a circle's circumference over its diameter. You can actually do the experiment yourself. Take any size of circle with its center known. Measure the diameter. Then measure the circumference of said circle by using rope. If you divide the circumference by the diameter, you'll get a number approximately equal to Pi.
its often associated with that bc thats usually the only thing people know about it: p=2πr. But π isnt that, its not JUST that. For example it also linking the Planck's constant with its reduced form: h=2πℏ
Thanks guys!
Yeah that bothered me too. It's such an easy response and by not saying it, she made it sound as though it were too complicated to explain on the spot.
@@Rachel-rs7jn well most often than not, something seems easy when you dont know much about it (its depth included)
@@kamilbxl6 I agree, but I think she could have said something like "right off the bat, here's one straightforward way to think about it." And then go into more depth. A concept being deep doesn't mean we can't also have a tangible way to think about it.
As a math enthusiast, I loved her saying, 'Thaat exactly equation, youll need... probably never'
Exact equations are nice to solve. However sometimes an equation can be made exact via an integrating factor.
as a physics enthusiast, I screamed "Noooo! You need it everyday!"
The beautiful concept of simplifying. Look at a convoluted mess, take little parts of it and rearrange them until they are in a form you're able to understand more easily but it is still the same.
All by having a set of rules to do so, invented by mathematicians.
That exact equation though.... yeah, definitely never.
props to whoever has to condense what the expert said into a whatever character count tweet, it always makes me anxious when they talk a bunch and I can't imagine a proper way of synthesizing the info.
I would so register for all of professor Moon's courses. She's got a teaching style that I wish more mathematicians have. It's her "bedside manner" that sets her apart. I promise!
chicken sandwich
wdym bedside manner
Even if she teaches over 5 courses in upper level math?
@@MrSeyohh mmm yummy
agree 100%! same! yes, her bedside manner is great!!
Love this lady, love how she explains things and also love her voice.
15:20 DUUUUUUUUUUUUDE omg Moon Duchin you made me so happy when you mentioned Noether. I have been studying a lot of regular rings and rings which are essentially of finite type over a field lately (also DVR's, which iirc, under some conditions at least, a Noetherian valuation ring is a DVR, since you have valuation ideals (I don't remember what the conditions are off the top of my head) ) so this made me really happy.
This math professor is so cool
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh that is delicious. Just like computing the limit of sin(x)/x as x goes to infinity.
Please have her back, she was super interesting
@@johnjohansson right wingers have like 1 joke
Loved this!
Hello Dr. Trefor! Your videos on discrete math helped me greatly! Thank you!
@dr trefor bazett~ thanks for sharing your talents so freely! not just another make up channel! 😻
She seems like such an awesome teacher!! And her name is Moon! How cool 🌙💖
chicken sandwich
Did I understand even half of what she was saying? No. But did I enjoy watching this and hearing her speak so passionately about it? Yes! 10/10 bring her back again!
"It'd be great if we could tell their stories better."
English major: "I have been summoned."
This is by far the most overwhelming Tech Support video. Everything else is beautiful comprehensible.
Some of these equations just lost me.
Like, "wtf is she talking about"
This has never happened with absorbing information before, but some of these equations are just mind-boggling.
I feel bad for you because this video is super dumbed-down and nothing is difficult here. Except her favorite theorem which she explained poorly.
@@High_Priest_Jonko Math be hard bro
Yeah I could’ve told you Moon was a mathematician immediately without ever hearing a word of math in this video. The vibes are so mathematician-y. Also apparently my analysis professor, Alex Eskin, was Moon’s doctoral advisor, which is neat. Facts that everyone in math loves chalkboards and hagoromo
When she brought out and explained the chalk board, I knew this was going to be good.
3:15 the japanese chalk 😭😭 why are we all like this 💀
I'm so mad! If I had someone in my life who explained math concepts like Prof. Duchin I wouldn't have been nearly as miserable. The whole part about mathematicians multiplying shapes made me really curious. I had no idea math in general had all this space for exploring and curiosity, I always thought of it (only) as a way to explain what already is and a secret list of rules or language for the stuff most ppl don't have to worry about. Well, I'm glad the good Prof exists and is helping more ppl even if it's too late for me 😅👵🏾
"mainstream" math if i can call it that seems to be as you say only one way to explain things, but thats cause those are the very basics. It feels rigid because those are the basic rules, kinda like learning the letter of the alphabet, but the deeper you dive into maths, it gets very crazy, very specific and very creative
With regards to arithmetic's order of operations, it's just convention.
You can't have a world where 2+2*2 is sometimes 8 and sometimes 6. We all need to be on the same page on what that expression means, otherwise things go very wrong very quickly..
Anyone remember when a NASA rocket exploded when some engineers used metric measurements and some used imperial? Yikes.
Best to all just agree that multiplication comes before addition so 2+2*2 always equals 6.
(there's no inherent reason for multiplication before addiction, it's just what was decided).
This is where brackets come handy.
chicken sandwich
I disagree. There is a good reason to put multiplication before addition. Fundamental things like linear combinations and polynomials would get a lot worse to write otherwise.
@@diribigal exactly, there is a reason for multiplication before addiction and it was also explained in the video. Without it a lot of mathematics would be way more difficult to represent
Was waiting in anticipation the whole time for whatever those Pringles were gonna be for lol.
One of the most incredible Q & A I have ever watched on UA-cam. I just love this!
Never thought I'd feel this way... But I could easily sit through a 90min lecture if she was explaining it
I realize I’m late to this party, but I just wanted to add my admiration for Prof. Duchin to the pile. I got to the end of the video and felt genuine regret that I’d never had a math professor like this, because I felt like if I had I might have gone into math academia and loved it. Thanks for spreading your passion in such an accessible way! :)
This was my first viewing of this series. I am quite flabbergasted and impressed. I liked the way(s) you defined imaginary numbers and Zero. That always perplexed me. Thank you.
As a math major, I enjoyed this video so much! And she explained it humorously for people to understand better
For those who are commenting about how Indians invented zero and not Mayans, she's not taking about the symbol "0" itself, she's talking about the CONCEPT OF ZERO (that was asked in twitter) which already existed before the symbol "0". She literally talks about how different civilizations developed their methods (one of them being Indians who invented the symbol "0" that we use now) of using the concept in numbering.
It is so cool to see some this excited possessing such a DEEP knowledge and passion for math.
13:50 Fractions over fractions is also very common in electrical engineering when analyzing/solving a circuit.
Fractions are just equivalence class of pairs under localization.
@@Grassmpl What does that mean? Lol
@@altuber99_athlete Given a commutative ring with 1, we can localize that ring by any of its prime ideals. In particular, localizing an integral domain by the 0 ideal produces its quotient field.
Here, our ring is the integers, which we localize at 0 ideal, giving the field of rational numbers aka the usual fractions.
zero was introduced by an indian mathematician named aryabhatta
I really didn't understand any of this but I would listen to her all day, she is fascinating.
My favorite person who had a hand in math was archimedes because he invented a device called the archimedes screw which we still use for irrigation and sewage treatment plants today, and he is also credited with creating statistics
I saw a youtube about Fulltouch chalk, by Hagoromo Stationery in Nagoya, Japan. Funny to see her mentioning it (well probably). The factor was going to shut down and in 2015 mathematicians starting hoarding it. Shin Hyeong-seok, a teacher in Korea, then took over manufacturing it and basically saved the minds of lots of math people.
I've got completely lost every time they got the chalkboard, but I really liked their explanations, and could see how in love with this they are
I don’t agree with the answer to “when am I ever going to need this?”. The OP may never need to solve this exact question but the ability to learn the abstractions and methods of solving problems will definitely be needed.
One aspect that would have greatly helped me, with learning Math, as a kid; if somebody would have given it context. We learned it 'because subject / we do'. Understanding that it is essentially an agreed language, for solving problems would have given it a lot more sense, to me. Like many languages, there are often many ways to say the same thing.
I would have loved math so much better if I had a teacher like her. She is so entertaining and also has a great sense of humour!
That was really interesting. I don’t love math, but this was great! The mathematician was an excellent teacher, she should have a show.
Thank you for making math interesting! I have a love/hate with numbers outside of my career in accounting/bookkeeping thanks to grade school teachers just writing on a board and expecting us to copy and learn. Maybe if I had someone enthusiastic teaching mathematics, it wouldn't have seemed so difficult and boring. You're amazing!
This was really cool! Great presenter and really interesting questions. Hoping to see another episode!
chicken sandwich
@@MrSeyohh I agree
As a mathematician, I agree with every single answer Prof. Duchin gave, except for the sexiet equation question, but that it's just a matter of taste (aka field of expertise).
Maths in school:- Ewww
Maths in yt:- YAAHHHH
The "explaining the joke" wisdom doesnt generally apply for language learning/teaching cultures.
If youre teaching English or learning mandarin or whatever, explaining the joke is usually the way to make it funny.
I love the excitement and enthusiasm this mathematician has for numbers and equations.
Truly something I’m not able to fathom.