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Comment by curt15 | Hacker News Reader

> Funny, I think it's a very widespread opinion to think of math as useless. In the US at least it's a major failure of the education system and STEM communicators.

That is a US centric view, and it's curious how things came to be that way. European and Asian countries take mathematics more seriously.

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Which is why I explicitly said "in the US at least."

That said, from my limited secondhand knowledge of global cultures re: mathematics, it seems to me that what other countries do better is appreciating the value of education in general, and for math that means applying math to acquire better-paying, more prestigious STEM jobs. I haven't seen a drastic difference in explaining pure mathematics or presenting it as having intrinsic value.

How is that working out for them? I am by no means an anti-intellectual and I do value knowledge for it's own sake. But Europeans in particular seem to be unable to translate their mathematics educations into any sort of practical economic growth.

"What worth is education if the workers it produces are not making the rich richer."

Education is about cultivating true richness of culture and mind. The economy is in service of a higher purpose - of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Not the other way around.

Can you stop with the flamebait posts? Especially the country specific ones, we're an international community.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50309981

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50295724

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50295076

Nope, those have nothing to do with any specific country, but rather a specific mindset that is ruining the world.

We did not appoint you as the decider of what constitutes flaimbait.

Poland is growing a lot. The Soviet block countries were big on math.

I think the people in Europe tend to be happy with a chosen system with a more balanced and more steady life outside of work at the cost of less billionaires and GDP growth. And they invent plenty of things, they just, like Salk, don’t seek as obsessively to extract maximum profit from it all.

Really? People in France don't seem too happy lately.

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/panic-and-anger-spread-as-e...

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