In his recent opinion editorial, “How to fall in love with Math”, Manil Suri makes a plea to his audience to understand Mathematics from a different perspective and states various examples on how to do so. Though the idea of falling in love with Math seems exciting, I find that some of his arguments are lacking in substance.
The author mentions that Mathematics should be appreciated in the same way as one can appreciate art without acquiring the ability to paint, or enjoy a symphony without being able to read music. What he does not note is that we are able to appreciate paintings and symphonies because they please our senses of sight and hearing respectively. However, the complex mathematical equations do not please any of our senses until we develop advanced mathematical skills. Thus it is quite difficult to appreciate profound mathematical ideas if we cannot perceive their meaning. For instance, it has been stated that Math can be better understood through enjoying the eye candy of fractal images - those black, amoeba like splotches, surrounded by bands of psychedelic colors. My question to the author is that how can anyone, except a mathematician, relate a mathematical rule to such images when he or she does not even know what these images look like.
Secondly, the author claims that human beings are wired for mathematics and that at some level, perhaps we all crave it. I don't think the author provides any substantial evidence to back this statement up. I have seen many college students struggling with Mathematics courses. If we had been wired for it, perhaps all of us would have eventually excelled at it, which is sadly not the case. From my experience, I believe that some people have innate mathematical skills similar to the domain of music and painting. I would have liked my beliefs to be challenged by the authors’ viewpoints, but convincing evidence hasn’t been provided.
The author also says that in schools, the opportunity to immerse students in interesting mathematical ideas is usually jettisoned to make more time for testing and arithmetic drills. Fortunately, in the institutions where I have received my education, only two to three examinations are held throughout the course of the year. The rest of the curriculum was solely based upon developing a strong understanding of the mathematical concepts and theorems in the students. However, even that approach did not lead to a large proportion of the student body ‘loving’ mathematics.
By virtue of being a mathematics professor, the author has based his arguments in such a way that they are meant for audience that is already in love with mathematics thus having an understanding of the concepts and images being referred to. This defeats the purpose of attracting scholars from other fields of life towards Mathematics.
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