48/2(9+3) = ???

48/2(9+3) = ?

  • 2

    Votes: 73 49.7%
  • 288

    Votes: 74 50.3%

  • Total voters
    147
With a electronic calculator it's either: 48/2*(9+3) = 288 or 48/(2(9+3)) = 2. The plain 48/2(9+3) is probably a calibration thingy, my "Sagitta Graphing Calculator" and my Casio fx-82MS showed 2.
 
Thinking about it a little more, I would wager that if you broke this question down a little further you'd see a trend in the differences in answer. I'd love to see a poll with home country (or at least country they went to elementary school in) comparing those who chose 2 (I'd be willing to bet a noticeable majority of Americans would go this route) vs. those who chose 288 (I'd guess more Europeans).

If you ask me most of it boils down to whether you were taught the order of operations as PEMDAS (Parenthesis, exponents, multiplication / division, addition / subraction) or as BODMAS (Brackets, orders, division / multiplication, addition / subtraction).

On the division/multiplication and addition / subtraction neither is suppose to get a preference, but I bet subconsciously a lot of people are giving the one that comes first in their particular acronym preference.

Point being, either way, when it comes to math, be precise, thorough, and as unambiguous as possibly, otherwise I'll fuck your face with a chainsaw.
 
Well in the end this is the discussion between people who never programmed in their life and those who have some basic understanding of coding in about any language.

The true anwser to this question is, considering it has been posted as line of text and not LaTeX or some other proper way of showing math notation properly(like scanned handwriting):

The problem is poorly defined.

That's it. The programmers will see ,,288" and the rest will most propably see ,,2" and this is NOT how math works, hence poorly defined.

Thanks for ,,2" guys calling the ,,288" guys complete retards. You brought the lulz to this thread. Mutant provided all the necessary proof of how machines would react to this(and most of programmers too). ,,2" guys were calling names, but Mutant was accused of being aggresive in some post, well - nice!

On that ,,quantity of" distribution thingy - I think they teach this particular thingy only in the US. Most of the EU books etc I have seen made it clear to have assumed a*(b+c) and a(b+c) to be exactly the same and the ,,*" is skipped for convenience(just like it is in ab instead of a*b).

Anyway, to those ,,2'' guys who were calling names, like
JeffTD said:
Sorry, but anyone who said 288 is retarded.

How do you feel now that you know you were only just partially right(just like the ,,288" guys, not targetting them though, they were nicer here :D)?
 
When I´m programming that is 288, and I´m with the machines.
2gvszyp.jpg

:lol:
This is fucking epic!
 
ive seen this thread on like 4 different forums the past few days. haha. theyre all like 20+ pages
 
OK i am back ! Muuuahahahaha :D

To end it for all eternity we need to identify all problems here:

1) The first problem is the division sign / which for some of you, extends under everything on its left side and over everything on its right side.

a) This question was asked on the Internet = computer world.
b) The equation was written using a computer keyboard = computer world.
c) In the computer world i know... from learning high ad medium level programming languages like BASIC on "Timex" ZX Spectrum clones in elementary school about 20 years ago, through playing with BASIC on my ancient Atari 65XE, writing some simple programs in Borland Pascal, C, MS Visual BASIC, C and C++, from using MS Excel and Open Office - the / sign only works on what is "touching" it on its left and right side... to extend it above and under the whole equation, you would have to put both sides in parentheses...

So:

48/2(9+3) is really:

48
-- (9+3)=288
2

I know that some of you (possibly just trolls) will not agree.
Well then we can get rid of the division sign, by transforming the equation according to rules of algebra :)

Dividing is multiplying by a reciprocal fractional.

x/y=x*(1/y)

So if x=6 and y=2

6/2=3
6*(1/2)=3

Get it ?

This gives us a possibility to transform the division by 2 into multiplication by 1/2 or better just 0.5 :)

So now we have:

48*0.5(9+3)=
=48*0.5*12= (inside brackets first)
=24*12= (then whichever multiplication we want)
=48*6= (or this one)
=288 (and the final multiplication)

2) The second problem is the multiplication without a multiplication sign...
a) some of you say that in such a case, we have a special kind of multiplication called "quantity of", "close relationship" etc... which has a priority over a normal kind of multiplication and division and the left to right rule... this is wrong and i will prove it wrong now and you will not prove it right ever.

Again using simple multiplication to division transformations:

48/2(9+3)=48/2/(1/(9+3))=288

Do you still see that magical closeness betwen 2 and the inside of the bracket ?
I highly doubt it :)

But if you still do, we can look at this little beauty:

(48/1)0.5(9+3)=288

LOL now which bracket the 0.5 which once was 2 has the closeness and "quantity of" magic with ?


Both problems solved.
The / operates only on what is closest to it and the invisible * sign is just an ordinary multiplication sign with no special priorities.
 
2) The second problem is the multiplication without a multiplication sign...
a) some of you say that in such a case, we have a special kind of multiplication called "quantity of", "close relationship" etc... which has a priority over a normal kind of multiplication and division and the left to right rule... this is wrong and i will prove it wrong now and you will not prove it right ever.

I'm not going to argue with you on the actual answer of this equation because I see that both outcomes are a possibility, but what you've just posted is not what we're saying. We're saying that it falls under the "parentheses" subheading, not the "multiplication" subheading of PEMDAS, or under a "simplification step" which is implied with and required by "parentheses" to begin with.

Maybe it's a language barrier, or maybe you're just being obstinante, but you're completely misconstruing the argument to fit your "proof."
 
Thanks for ,,2" guys calling the ,,288" guys complete retards. You brought the lulz to this thread. Mutant provided all the necessary proof of how machines would react to this(and most of programmers too). ,,2" guys were calling names, but Mutant was accused of being aggresive in some post, well - nice!

How do you feel now that you know you were only just partially right(just like the ,,288" guys, not targetting them though, they were nicer here :D)?

Yes, because I was the only person in the beginning of this discussion who was on the offensive and Mutant did nothing at all to antagonize or instigate the opposing crowd.

I feel mostly retarded for arguing over something so stupid as the vagueness of a math problem, and still hold that 2 is a viable answer, but to say that "they were nicer here" is horseshit.
 
Good... now i can stop being so nice ! ;)

JeffTD if you can't post a link to some respectable publication, or even a scan from any printed book (preferably approved for teaching in public schools), your extraordinary claims will be just trolling to me.

If you are trolling, then i admit that you trolled me succesfully and for that you deserve a cookie. :)
 
This conversation might take the cake for being the most heated pointless argument on sneap forum yet.

Please resume throwing poop at one another.

I put it in a casio and the answer was 2 also, and I knew it would be 2. Although I didn't need the calculator to confirm it. It's just so basic.

Anyway, I agree that this thread is pointless! It's such a basic thing that you won't encounter anywhere in else but forums.