#college math

[speronyx]

why would someone study complex analysis?

(this isn't sarcasm, my professor is shit and we genuinely want to know the hype about it, because rn it seems really boring)

[er-cryptid]

Partial Fraction Decomposition Ex. 5

Patreon

[izzyizz1]

I am nervous about school, math has never come easily for me, I could use some encouragement. My math anxiety makes me anxious in general sometimes.

[albions-seed]

Sooo...random personal post!

I'm going to back to college in August for my business degree and I'm dreading all things math. I excel in everything but that. The last time I was actively enrolled in college was in 2011 (I know lol) and I attempted one of the required developmental math courses in 2016, which I failed miserably. My accuplacer test scores are now expired, so I'm putting off any courses that require a math prerequisite in order to prepare for the updated accuplacer testing. I'm giving myself about 6 months to study for it, and I know Tumblr has a big studyblr community here.

Please help! I will probably need to have a refresher on pre-algebra, maybe even as far back as middle school math topics as well.

Any tips, study guides, or references I can use? I am viewing these next several months as a chance to start fresh with mathematic concepts (and maybe even an opportunity to learn to love math), and would appreciate any suggestions no matter how juvenile or silly it'd be!

[biochemsitry]

So I was wondering if anyone can explain this to me. I doubt anyone can but it's at least an interesting story I think. (Disclaimer: if you aren't a math person, this might be pretty confusing, but I will try to explain stuff.)

I'm sitting in my 300 level calc 1 class. We're learning about instantaneous velocity and limits and the like, not super hard stuff. This is the fourth class period we've had so it hasn't gotten to the hard stuff yet.

By the way, I go to a tiny private university. I'm one of 5 students in this class. My uni is, um, known for not being great with math-- we literally have two math profs in total. Two. I think we have 3 math majors in total, and all three are in this class. The fourth is math ed. I'm biochem.

Back to what happened today. Our prof, let's call her Dr. H, is explaining limits (for non-math or science ppl, it involved lots of graphs and functions and letters). The freshman math ed major, let's call him J, is very confused and raises his hand. "What does f(x) mean?" he asks.

Dr. H pauses, unsure of how to answer. The other 4 students, including me, try to explain f(x) to J. Dr. H ends up drawing a graph on the whiteboard to explain that f(x) often, at least at the level we're at and with the stuff we're talking about, is the same as y. f(x)=x is the same as y=x. f(x)=3x-1 is the same as y=3x-1.

J seems to be satisfied with this explanation, so Dr. H continues the lecture. A few minutes later, she gives an example problem with both f(x) and g(x). J is now more confused than ever.

"Wait, what's g(x)?" he asks.

"g(x) is the same as y in this situation," Dr. H answers.

"But I thought f(x) was y."

At this point, we're all looking at J in disbelief. For people who don't know, g(x), f(x), h(x), etc. in graphing are all representative of y on a graph, at least typically, and at least in contexts like this.

Dr. H pauses, then says, "I think we need to have a conversation about functions after class."

Now, don't get me wrong. Functions can be hard. If you're not a math person, it's easy to go without knowing what they are. I'm not trying to put anyone down for not knowing what they are. My mom never got past algebra 1 and either never learned them or has completely forgotten about them. But then again, my 16yo brother with severe discalcula (math dyslexia, basically) knows at least about functions and he's barely even done pre-algebra...

But this kid made it into calculus apparently without any knowledge of functions, which (I think???) are usually taught at the algebra 1 level (so about 8th-9th grade, or 13-15yo, at least in the US. It's usually younger in other countries though, at least from what I gather?). It's not something you'd learn at age 14 and never use again until college-- most maths from algebra 1 and up use functions pretty much all the time. But this freshie is, like, 17-18, and a math ed major, who must have either klepped out of lower math courses, or had gotten a high enough score on the ACT/SAT to be able to go directly into calc 1. This guy's smart-- he seems to be really good at math other than functions. I just have absolutely no idea how he made it into calc without knowing about functions. Just... how?????

(In case anyone's wondering, we absolutely did NOT try to make J feel bad. None of us students even said anything about it afterwards at all. We just don't do that. Dr. H was very kind in how she handled the situation, too. Never make a person feel bad for not knowing something. I'm not making fun of him by posting this, either; I'm just very confused lol. I doubt he'll see this, and if he does, I doubt he'll know it's me talking about him. He's a smart guy, and I'm not blaming him for his lack of knowledge on functions. I'm mostly just wondering how his HS teachers neglected to teach him about such a basic and important part of math.)

[lavena]

I did not survive, I was tryna nap b4 work after my 8am math class (why, what did I do to piss of the academic advisor, 3 times a week at 8am with a prof that doesn't know how to fucking teach) and my roommate has her phone on and it wakes me up right after I started falling asleep, my phone, blissfully on vibrate then goes off, rahhhg

Get your ribbon here

[augmentedpolls]

This is after any curve is applied

edit: second to last option is /lh

[one-time-i-dreamt]

Brennan Lee Mulligan was teaching me math in college. I wasn't exactly paying attention, because I was playing Minecraft. He said, "This is where you'll be, but you'll need to have all this." And it was just a studying PSA.

[iheartgirlzn]

leo “i could do college maths at 8 years old” valdez x jason “dyscalculia” grace

[persnickety-doodles]

study time 📚

Old college AU sketches 🥹

[xyymath]

Things Math Professors Say

"The proof is trivial." (Oh, cool. Guess I’m just an idiot then.)

"Left as an exercise." (Translation: You’ll never solve this in a million years.)

"It’s obvious, really." (Sure, if you’re a demigod.)

"By inspection." (Stares harder at problem… still nothing.)

"For small values of epsilon." (How small? Subatomic? Microscopic? Vibes?)

"WLOG (Without Loss of Generality)." (Oh, we’re just assuming it doesn’t matter now? Alright.)

"Details omitted." (Because apparently, you don’t need to understand it.)

"By the usual argument." (Which you somehow don’t know because you weren’t born in 1702.)

"Assume the rest holds." (That’s some impressive optimism right there.)

"The usual abuse of notation." (Why does this feel like an emotional wound?)

"Almost surely correct." (But also possibly wrong? Cool, thanks for the clarity.)

"A non-rigorous approach." (I thought math was supposed to be precise?!)

"Assume it’s obvious." (Buddy, NOTHING about this is obvious.)

"The reader may verify." (No, the reader may CRY.)

"To the interested reader." (Guess I’m not interested enough, huh?)

"Well-behaved functions only." (We’re function-shaming now?)

"Obvious to the trained eye." (Guess I’ll never make it out of amateur league.)

"A trivial case analysis." (Trivial to WHO??)

"Integrate by parts, twice." (Bold of you to assume I got it the first time.)

"As you can clearly see." (Oh, I clearly see my FAILURE, alright.)

"It works in practice too." (Unlike me, who barely works at all.)

"Assume a spherical cow." (Are we doing math or abstract sculpture?)

"A standard result." (Not in my standards, pal.)

"We skip the tedious algebra." (No, no, please—I wanted to suffer MORE.)

"Assume non-zero solutions exist." (Okay, now we’re just assuming life works out.)

"The usual topology." (Bro, I don’t even know the unusual topology.)

"Finitely many cases left." (Just kidding, there’s 72.)

"By virtue of symmetry." (Virtue? I have none left.)

"Don’t worry about the constant." (The constant is probably my GPA dropping.)

"Assume continuity." (I’m assuming my brain is breaking.)

"Smooth functions only." (Guess I’ll leave, I’m clearly not smooth enough.)

"The simplest non-trivial case." (Simplest? NON-TRIVIAL? Pick a side!)

"Epsilon goes to zero." (Epsilon isn’t the only one losing it.)

"And the rest follows." (Where? Straight to my breakdown?)

[joytri]

boarding school aesthetic

[dustykneed]

i wanted to paint water and then shore leave mcspirk happened... not complaining though ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

been working on this on and off for like... a week and a half i think?? would this have gone quicker if i had used any references at all (yes. the answer is always yes)

[izzyizz1]

And I did it all while screaming

[so-very-small]

the thing about g/t is that it has a lot to do with math and physics. which, as someone who personally cannot do either, is initially very scary. but it turns out no one else here can do math either, and we bond over this. and when some fellow g/t fan CAN do math? and talks about physics? we hail them as a wizard. truly gods amongst men.

all hail the G/t STEM Wizards.

[mythology-void]

the only reason i'm in academia is for those perfectly incandescent moments when you've been staring at the same problem for 3 hours and then you finally, finally connect the dots (all on your own!) and you are instantly suffused with that shivery golden kind of pleasure because you did it! you figured it out. and maybe life is worth something because look at the beauty you're creating