2026-09-15 01:02 UTC
People constantly say they "can't do math" in their heads, when what they really mean is "arithmetic". But "arithmetic" is harder to say than "math". So let's start calling arithmetic "rith", which is easy to say (and also sounds a bit like "rizz", which is fun).
Also, I _can_ do rith in my head, but I know that's nerdy and maybe you can't.
Replies (2)
-
@paul_ipv6@infosec.exchange 2026-09-15 01:05
@robpike@cosocial.ca rith makes sense. that's where the "three R's" comes from. reading, riting, and rithmetic. apparently spelling isn't very important. ;)
-
@nelson@tech.lgbt 2026-09-15 01:22
@robpike@cosocial.ca are you able to do complex arithmetic exactly or do you simply have good number sense? when I interviewed people at google I used to test if they could estimate scale numbers. "so a web page is 10kB, and there's 1 billion web pages. Is that a lot? How much storage do you need?" Amazed only half of candidates could figure that.