Math or Maths: You Decide

The outcome of this is legally binding.

The losing country will never be so stupid again.

I cant be arsed to look for any proof, but I'm sure we were calling it Mathematics, way before we decided to colonise the USA.

Stupid feckers lost the 's' in the ocean somewhere.

Give me an example of a "Math". One problem? So a exam with twenty problems is a "Maths exam"? Or is Geometry a "math" and Algebra a "math" and Calculus a "math", and together they are "maths"?

My text book when i was 12 was called a "Math Book"... blame the authorities.

They talk about "the sands of time"... but when you go to the beach you play in the "sand". You don't play with one speck of sand. So why is "sand" plural in that case?

Математика

If we are being completely technical here, its good old Webster that decided after the end of the Revolutionary War for the US to have a slightly different English than the Brits. He's the one that printed up dictionaries with changes such as gray, theater, center, honor, etc. He single handedly changed the English language. I'm sure Math is one of those things as well....

So get with the program you darn Brits, I'll email a Merriam's-Webster's dictionary to help you out f needed..:p

EdelBrock wrote: If we are being completely technical here, its good old Webster that decided after the end of the Revolutionary War for the US to have a slightly different English than the Brits. He's the one that printed up dictionaries with changes such as gray, theater, center, honor, etc. He single handedly changed the English language. I'm sure Math is one of those things as well....

So get with the program you darn Brits, I'll email a Merriam's-Webster's dictionary to help you out f needed..:p

I'll go check my American Heritage Dictionary.

edit: They can't help it. It has Math - Mathematics.

edit 2: I take it all back. The Concise Oxford also has Math - Mathematics, but it also has Maths - Mathematics.

It seems both forms are acceptable British English. It would seem you Engerlishers should consult your own Dictionaries before passing judgment.

edit 3: My Webster's lists both forms, but designates Maths as British.

Maths.

Look this isn't a debate, it's a simple vote.

Please keep your dumb opinions to yourselves.

Anyone caught using the wrong form after the vote finishes will be banned.

El Jarvo wrote: Does anyone else sit and verbally add 'ssss' whenever they hear an American TV show used the phrase 'math'?

Please say it's not just me. It can't just be me.

I do it too. Now I'm not sure if that makes you feel better or worse but there you have it.

I also add in words, so that the septic phrase "let's go check the scores" becomes the Engerlish "let's go AND check the scores". It only started bothering me when they started making Paddy Stewart say things wrongly in ST-First Contact.

It's Maths BTW, it's our language, so by definition our version is correct. Still, what do you expect from a land where "football" is played with a non-sphere (ie, not a ball), and barely involves the feet. On a slightly related note, I watched a thing recently where some kids of about 8 or 9 in some African country (possibly Rwanda), were doing geography, the teacher was pointing to countries (albeit fairly major ones) and the kids were firing back the answers like lightning. How the hell can some half-starved wretch of a thrid world child, who gets about 1 hour's schooling a day, be better educated than an adult from the world's richest nation? I mean is it nature (geneticly engrained stupidity) or nurture (being proud to know more about Poof Diddler than your own nation's laughably short, history)?

EDIT: In Chicago, Lecturer said to class "these guys come from Ireland", half the class looked about dying to say "hey me too", then the lecturer said "Ireland is off the west coast of Europe, can anyone point it out?". Now I lie not, when I say that what ensued was a tragedy invloving one foolish lad with a pointer making a total balls of finding EUROPE!, and then acting as pointer operator while we did a world tour trying to isolate, first Europe, then the UK, then Ireland, then the awkward bit at the top. I suppose it's fair enough for primary school kids, this was a fucking COLLEGE and these people were degree students aged 16-60!!!!! And any of us could have pointed to 6 out of ten major US cities too. I cannot understand why they (those septics who are this daft) are so proud of it, surely it puts them at a monstrous disadvantage, since most folks outside the US know the US (rammed down our gobs by TV of course), better than jesuslanders know anywhere else.

Maths.

Doctor? wrote: In Chicago, Lecturer said to class "these guys come from Ireland", half the class looked about dying to say "hey me too", then the lecturer said "Ireland is off the west coast of Europe, can anyone point it out?". Now I lie not, when I say that what ensued was a tragedy invloving one foolish lad with a pointer making a total balls of finding EUROPE!, and then acting as pointer operator while we did a world tour trying to isolate, first Europe, then the UK, then Ireland, then the awkward bit at the top. I suppose it's fair enough for primary school kids, this was a fucking COLLEGE and these people were degree students aged 16-60!!!!! And any of us could have pointed to 6 out of ten major US cities too. I cannot understand why they (those septics who are this daft) are so proud of it, surely it puts them at a monstrous disadvantage, since most folks outside the US know the US (rammed down our gobs by TV of course), better than jesuslanders know anywhere else.

So yer trying to tell me its important to know where Europe is, let alone Ireland???

Not if you're planning to bomb us, no

Not knowing where Ireland is, that's acceptable, but not finding it based on "off the west coast of Europe", what that is, is ridiculous. Any wonder your airforce can only achieve accuracy of +/- 1 tectonic plate.

El Jarvo wrote: Does anyone else sit and verbally add 'ssss' whenever they hear an American TV show used the phrase 'math'?

Please say it's not just me. It can't just be me.

Sven does that too.

i dont care what the vote says, we invented the language & we say it's maths.

whilst we are here what happened to the "it" at the end of "ronaldo takes it" when talking about free kicks, fed up with this lazy destruction of engerlish, i mean "ronaldo takes" is just wrong.

Hibster, can we have a ruling on the device often used on newspaper headlines in the USA where a comma is used in place of the word 'and'?

Things like

AREA MAN GETS DRUNK, FALLS OVER

or

Sex offender upset by signs on house, car

or

Police believe bank exec killed family, self

You do see examples of it sneaking into UK news websites where syndicated stories are reproduced. I have yet to see it in print in this country.

It's bound to make it over here sooner or later, so an early ruling on it's use would be helpful in dealnig with it when it does occur.

I quite like it, I'd probably permit it if it was up to me.

Math

Rev Big wrote: Hibster, can we have a ruling on the device often used on newspaper headlines in the USA where a comma is used in place of the word 'and'?

Things like

AREA MAN GETS DRUNK, FALLS OVER

or

Sex offender upset by signs on house, car

or

Police believe bank exec killed family, self

You do see examples of it sneaking into UK news websites where syndicated stories are reproduced. I have yet to see it in print in this country.

It's bound to make it over here sooner or later, so an early ruling on it's use would be helpful in dealnig with it when it does occur.

I quite like it, I'd probably permit it if it was up to me.

Dunno what Hibster will rule, but I conject that the first case is acceptable insofar as it refers to a(n albeit unfinished) chain of causality. The other two examples are, of course, another vile rape of the mother tongue by her simpleton whelps.

Funny, I made the first one up and got the other two from the CNN site.

So it goes

Shug wrote: It's MATHS.

Anything else is just wrong.

CUNTS.

MATH.

wankface.

|| | ||| 6217|| 8 || 3 wrote: Математика

same as matematyka in polish, which is the same as mathematics (saw it in dictionary).

It's Maffs innit?

Maths then.

jeff, when your country can pronounce aluminium properly it can have an opinion.

Jeffari-al-Texani wrote: We pronounce aluminum just fine, thanks...

another case where that pesky extra letter just gets tossed out!!!

I love you all, but I think I'm going to choose darkness...

Do you all say nucular or is it just the chief dope? No reduction in letters just another corruption.

By the way it's Sums.

hibster wrote: jeff, when your country can pronounce aluminium properly it can have an opinion.

and 'schedule'

I say maths,

but why all this division

sum times I despair

plus it's nothing we can't sort out over a nice piece of pi

That just doesn't add up, Minx

Doctor? wrote:

Rev Big wrote: Hibster, can we have a ruling on the device often used on newspaper headlines in the USA where a comma is used in place of the word 'and'?

Things like

AREA MAN GETS DRUNK, FALLS OVER

or

Sex offender upset by signs on house, car

or

Police believe bank exec killed family, self

You do see examples of it sneaking into UK news websites where syndicated stories are reproduced. I have yet to see it in print in this country.

It's bound to make it over here sooner or later, so an early ruling on it's use would be helpful in dealnig with it when it does occur.

I quite like it, I'd probably permit it if it was up to me.

Dunno what Hibster will rule, but I conject that the first case is acceptable insofar as it refers to a(n albeit unfinished) chain of causality. The other two examples are, of course, another vile rape of the mother tongue by her simpleton whelps.

While I would agree that the last two are jacked up (think it possibly would be better with a semicolon) I think the Brits butcher their language far more than we. Each area of Ingerland needs subtitles trying to understand even the words coming outta thier gobs... let alone know what thier trying to get those funny words to mean

Fit?

Marvin wrote:

hibster wrote: jeff, when your country can pronounce aluminium properly it can have an opinion.

and 'schedule'

and 'oregano'

Boatraceface wrote:

Marvin wrote:

hibster wrote: jeff, when your country can pronounce aluminium properly it can have an opinion.

and 'schedule'

and 'oregano'

spot on

and Herbs

Minx says tomayto, Chris says tomarto!

Project

Prahjekt (American)

Proe.......jekt (Australian)

Boatraceface wrote: and 'oregano'

Just how do the Greeks pronounce it?

Speaking of which, how do the originators of the word "mathematike" feel about dropping the "ematike" off the word, and adding an "s"?

MATHS

"Mathematic or Mathematics?

Math 	[6] 	
		  [20.00%]

* Maths [24] [80.00%]"

Minx wrote: I say maths,

but why all this division

sum times I despair

plus it's nothing we can't sort out over a nice piece of pi

It's a product of our times...

Math gets more than 25 times more hits on Google than Maths, more than 5,000,000 hits.

Maths is endemic to a traditional quaint regional island dialect

http://www.math.com/

http://www.maths.com

to the victor, goes the spoils even if means corrupting a language

Weapons of Math Instruction

At New York's Kennedy airport today, an individual later discovered to be a public school teacher was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a protractor, a T-square, a slide rule, and a calculator. At a morning press conference, Attorney general John Ashcroft said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. The man is being charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-gebra is a fearsome cult," Ashcroft said. "They desire average solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a search for absolute value. They use secret code names like x and y and refer to themselves as unknowns, but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, there are 3 sides to every triangle," Ashcroft declared.

When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "If God had wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes. I am gratified that our government has given us a sine that it is intent on protracting us from these math-dogs who are willing to dis-integrate us with calculus disregard. Murky statisticians love to inflict plane on every sphere of influence," the President said, adding: "Under the circumferences, we must differentiate their root, make our point, and draw the line."

President Bush warned, "These weapons of math instruction have the potential to decimal everything in their math on a scalene never before seen unless we become exponents of a Higher Power and begin to factor-in random facts of vertex."

Attorney General Ashcroft said, "As our Great Leader would say, read my ellipse. Here is one principle he is uncertainty of: though they continue to multiply, their days are numbered as the hypotenuse tightens around their necks."

'gotten'

Wheres the 'couldnt give a fuck' option on the poll

Gazman wrote: Wheres the 'couldnt give a fuck' option on the poll

Yeah, that.

And while I'm at it, for me, it's Mathematics.

hibster wrote: jeff, when your country can pronounce aluminium properly it can have an opinion.

actually, it was called aluminum before aluminium. the american pronunciation is closer to its latin root, alumina (according to wikipedia).

so there.

what about Australia? Let a third continent be the tie breaker of this incredibly meaningless debate.

0_o wrote: what about Australia? Let a third continent be the tie breaker of this incredibly meaningless debate.

No luck there. We tend to go with the British, except for some states where they can't pronounce things like dance, chance, France etc.

I've just "GOTTEN" myself out of bed. I should get off to work "ALREADY".

Oh dear ,i've turned American in my sleep

arithmatics

It's maths.

Period

Jeffari-al-Texani wrote:

I love you all, but I think I'm going to choose darkness...

that a reference to the band, jeff?

i meant the rather good band "i love you, but i've chosen darkness", not that naff faux metal pub band "the darkness"

El Jarvo wrote:

True dat. Seen.

looks like somebody else turned american overnight.

my wife is a mathamatical instructor and she says its called sums

thats "maths teacher" to english folk.

Maths

The polling is broken, can a moderator check into it? I voted and it only counted as one vote.... but its clear and obvious that my vote is worth 50 votes compared to all these plebian votes

EdelBrock wrote: The polling is broken, can a moderator check into it? I voted and it only counted as one vote.... but its clear and obvious that my vote is worth 50 votes compared to all these plebian votes

Spotty just picked up a load of used polling software, from a Mr J Bush of Florida I believe.

dimpled chads anyone????

Am I the only one, who on hearing of the chads and their involvement in this election nonsense, who had a mental image of endless big nosed geezer peering over walls bearing slogans like "Wot, no democracy?" and "Wot, no black people with polling cards?"

Oh I'd forgotten about him, I used to doodle him all the time, usually in MathS class.

Was at my boys parents night tonight, his teacher said he was good at MathS

Howard Jacobson (the novelist), whose politics I almost never agree with but whose prose style I admire, has long ago settled this question!

Excerpt for those who are too lazy to read entire article (which is mostly about other US linguistic outrages):

"But then only a nation with no ear would study math. There is no point in arguing this. Maths is right, math is wrong. You hear it or you don't. Your lookout. Ask yourself this question, though: do you really want to follow into war a country that thinks that math sounds right?"

Howard Jacobson in Independent years ago

All Brit voting on the matter has been revoked as of 6 am this morning. It has now been concluded that MATH is the proper spelling of the term. The matter has now been closed from all further discussion. So shut yer gobs

Don't know why you'd want to send them there, considering they got rid of the waterboarding....

Old Lead Foot wrote: arithmatics

isn't arithmetic just one branch of maths though, with geometry, algebra, trigonometry etc on top

Classic Hibster

I've just "GOTTEN" myself out of bed. I should get off to work "ALREADY".

You have serious ISSUES son!

Period

ROCKET MICK wrote: I've just "GOTTEN" myself out of bed. I should get off to work "ALREADY".

You have serious ISSUES son!

hibster wrote: i dont care what the vote says, we invented the language & we say it's maths.

whilst we are here what happened to the "it" at the end of "ronaldo takes it" when talking about free kicks, fed up with this lazy destruction of engerlish, i mean "ronaldo takes" is just wrong.

Maths...

And shouldn't "Ronaldo takes it" be followed by "up the arse"?

Snorri xxx

MATH as in JOB....i have had one JOB!:D

ROCKET MICK wrote: MATH as in JOB....i have had one JOB!:D

Blow that...

Snorri xxx

Biggest Thing on Two Wheels wrote: Period

that'd explain the grouchiness....