Math Is Fun Forum

PatternMan

Member

Registered: 2014-03-08

Posts: 199

Where does PEDMAS/BIDMAS come from?

*what is it's origin?

*We are taught this in school but do we actually need to use it?

*Are there better ways to do algebra rather than remembering the acronym?

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"School conditions you to reject your own judgement and experiences. The facts are in the textbook. Memorize and follow the rules. What they don't tell you is the people that discovered the facts and wrote the textbooks are people like you and me."

Agnishom

Real Member

From: Riemann Sphere

Registered: 2011-01-29

Posts: 24,996

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Re: Where does PEDMAS/BIDMAS come from?

2. Yes. Precedence of the operators is important. When somebody says 8+8*5 you know it is 48 by giving higher preceence to *. Supposing + was higher, it would have been 80. So, you need a convention to express what you want to.
While it is very important to know the operator precedences correct. However, in higher mathematics, nobody encounters expressions like (6*7+3^4-8)/2. Everybody usually uses brackets and fractions to make it non-confusing.

3. I do not know but after some days, it will look natural to you.

Last edited by Agnishom (2014-11-15 12:50:39)

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'And fun? If maths is fun, then getting a tooth extraction is fun. A viral infection is fun. Rabies shots are fun.'
'God exists because Mathematics is consistent, and the devil exists because we cannot prove it'
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