this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2025
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Math Memes
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Jokes and tricks that hinge on unclear communication (eg: not using parenthesis or other notation to make intent clear), and then are smug when people are tricked, remind me of the old xkcd https://xkcd.com/169/
I just saw some jokes about factorials so at least I got this one, heh.
Sorry but what is unclear in OPs image?
25 - 5 ÷ 5when read naively left to right looks like it would be "25 - 5 = 20. Then take that and divide by 5, for an answer of 4". It would be clearer to write it as(25 - 5) ÷ 5or25 - (5 ÷ 5)depending on what's intended.You see those kind of "gotcha!" posts online sometimes, where someone posts a problem that tempts you into doing order of operations wrong.
Someone who sees how to do it correctly immediately and thinks everyone knows that is invited to view https://xkcd.com/2501/ as well.
Hey, Munroe is a rather cool and very intelligent engineer. Very witty writer, and awful at drawing. But his philosophy is mid at best. He is not an authority, and is often wrong or common place when it comes to social topics and human affairs. He understands communication in a very techy engineering dimension. There's no need to take his comics as anything but what they are. One white dude's anecdotic commentary on his own very limited experience of the human condition. He knows squat about human communication, sociology, psychology or postmodernism.