i think we’re making some progress here. I thought about this a lot yesterday. What I basically think is that most things are not inherently boring. If even one person finds it interesting, then there is some potential for it being interesting.
If someone has been introduced to “real math” (of course that’s a subjective term, but I think we know what we mean, here) I don’t think they could find it boring. They may legitimately have no interest in it for various reasons, but they would have to admit that someone could find it interesting.

It’s a matter of taste, at that level. Some people don’t like Brussels sprouts. Some people love them. That doesn’t mean Brussels sprouts taste bad. It means that some people have no taste for them. And that’s fine. There’s no moral judgement about that. People can find math uninteresting, but that is their personal taste, not something math is responsible for. They may love languages, and someone else finds languages “boring.” Does that mean that languages are boring? If they were, how come some people find them fascinating?

We can have certain feelings towards something, and that is our prerogative. But that doesn’t mean that that something is how we feel about it. That something is the object, and we are subjective about it.

It’s the people that have never tried Brussels sprouts, or only had them from a can, or poorly prepared, and dictate that “Brussels sprouts taste bad!” who are, well, idiots. Or immature. Or ignorant. I think that would be the majority of the people who think they hate Brussels sprouts.

There are many degrees of each, but one thing I think can be definite – “Math is boring” still says more about the person than about math. It says nothing about math. Math doesn’t care what we think. It doesn’t bore.

By the way, I’m not referring to “school math,” as a subject. If it is taught poorly, it can be boring as hell. But that has nothing to do with math.

Personality’s a funny thing… I agree with what you’re saying that if someone finds math boring – even when they’ve learned “true math” as it were – it says more about the person themselves, but in what way? I mean, I’m pretty sure people have natural inherent personilties disregarding their attitudes that have been prehaps shaped by their experiences, so would it not be possible for someone to find maths boring, or prehaps uninteresting, anyway?

I also find it improbable that people who give math a fair chance, without choosing to believe it is boring in the first place, could find it boring. They don’t have to become fascinated by it, but to continue to insist that it is boring would be pretty improbable, I think. It’s not the experience of hundreds of underpriviledged pupils who I have taught that ended up telling me they loved math and did much better at it then when they learned “the school” way.

Some didn’t end up liking it, naturally. Their choice.

I’ll either figure it out or I won’t, but I’m glad to read a real mathematician’s thoughts on the overall situation hitting so close to home. Good read.

(at any rate, I still love working with “mathemagicians” as I tend to call them..)

Real math on the other hand is magical and flexible. There is another type of teacher that is inspired and creative. You have to kiss a lot of frogs to find one, though, I’ll admit. Just don’t give up on math.

Get your hands on “The Art of the Infinite,” by Kaplan, or “The Art of Mathematics” by Jerry P. King, and then write back after you’ve started them.

You can’t let bad teachers screw you up forever. You have to take things into your own hands at some time.

Remember, Einstein said, “It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education.”

Also I hope you get a therapist and deal with your own shame rather than project it onto others online.

peace.

Brian (reluctantly) answers:

Aj,

You sound like you need a nap. After you wake up sober, why don’t you re-read what I actually wrote, so that you might understand it.

It is fascinating how a person who apparently got into college can make so many false assumptions and then tear into someone he knows nothing about, beginning with an insult and ending with a mealy-mouthed “peace.”

I don’t really want to print your comment, nor debate someone who hasn’t bothered to understand the premise, but I thought it might be enlightening to readers to see what kind of minds we are up against when we put out so much free material, only in the hopes to help those who insist on making themselves helpless in the face of mathematics or any thing else which requires effort to understand.

Once again, people like you are the proof that “no good deed goes unpunished.”

Fortunately, there are hundreds that send e-mails of thanks for every whinging crank.

My heart goes out to well-meaning and well-qualified teachers who have to face students who feel entitled to flaunt their ignorance.