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Teachers of the future will say "Did you just assume the squares arrangement bigot? 2 days suspension and arrangement therapy session for you"

I think the data scientist is approaching this in the wrong way, but you can tell he's talking about emergent properties... the same concept that applies to mass defect in matter, or a physical property 'popping' into existence due to the specific kinds of interactions of the smaller components. His argument is basically comparing standard logical arithmetic to how math is used in practical application. If you look closely, he acknowledges that he is talking about semantics. I don't agree with his approach, but mainly only because his argument is trying to reinvent the wheel.

To explain his squares picture: if a square is defined as a polygon with 4 equal length sides based on simple delineations, there is a possible configuration of 4 individual squares that would result in 5 squares being present. Therefore, in the same way that sqrt(4)=2 is often used as a shorthand for the fact that the answer '2' is the correct possible answer of sqrt(4) based on implied constraints on the system (sqrt4 is actually 2 and -2), it would follow that a textbook author could clarify some system of semantics where 2+2=5 would be an acceptable shorthand to represent a solution to a specific kind of geometry question with specific kinds of constraints. It's a bad idea for textbook author to take that approach because it will absolutely cause confusion, but you can see the meat of the argument that he is making.

His square scenario would be more correctly written as "2+2→5" like what you would see when balancing a chemical equation.

Exactly.

True, decimals are important, but even decimal versions of irrational numbers are going to have rounding errors, and those rounding errors (if left unaccounted) can result in absurd statements like 2+2=5.

If we approach his examples from the premise of uncertainty, by chipping off a decimal play for 2.3 + 2.3, there would be an uncertainty in any of these truncated numbers that is -0/+1 if the numbers after the floating point are just discarded. The answer would then be "2(-0/+1) + 2(-0/+1) = 4(-0/+2)". If you were first rounding to the nearest number in order to remove the decimal, it would look something like: "2(±0.5) + 2(±0.5) = 4(±1)"

But, if you are familiar with programming and computation, there can be an advantage to losing precision and accuracy in order to attain faster computation.

It depends on the application.

But if you had truncated values which you were trying to compare to see if they were equivalent, this is where a plus/minus uncertainty comes in handy. If 4.6 was rounded to 5, these types of rounding would have that ±0.5 uncertainty build in. So if I created a program where a=2.3, b=2.3, c=4.6, and for whatever reason I wanted to remove the floating point by rounding, the new variables would look like A=2,B=2,C=5. If I wanted to check if a+b=c, based on the decimal values, it would come out 'true'. If I wanted to test A+B=C it would be 'false' unless I took the extra time to make it consider the uncertainty due to rounding. In which case there would be a valid possible configuration therefore the statement can be 'true' in a least one consideration. The accumulated uncertainty of A+B would create a value with a wider uncertainty than true C. The thing we would be checking against is also whether that degree of varied uncertainty between A+B and true C would be acceptable. (I.e is 5±0.5 reasonably the same as 5±1?)

Anyway, metrology and all of that.

I'm not saying the data scientist was making a smart statement, but I think his observation is worth a discussion of why we do the things we already do. For all I know this guy is just some wokist trying to "decolonize" math cirricula, which is basically to say he's trying to intellectually vandalize something that already works better than his proposed approach.

I think there is value in trying to understand and break down where someone is coming from in order to completely and comprehensively address the issue to the point that they can recognize for themselves that their position is not a good one.

Yeah nigger, read the title again lol

I fucking had to write a proof for it in a 400 level math class in college.

Maybe... loosely?

2 = 1+1
4 = 1+1+1+1

Therefore, leading from those tautological statements, 2+2=4 is really just 1+1+1+1=1+1+1+1

The chick may be talking about emergent properties in a system, however the Harvard graduate is not.


Like you have demonstrated by cherry picking one response instead of the idiotic claim made by the original poster. That woman is merely attempting to rationalize the insanity in the claim that 2+2=5

The moment that they started deviating into "emergent property systems" is when they started attacking a strawman.