World Without Mathematics: Catastrophic Scenarios

Does everyone like mathematics? No.
But do we have to accept it and study it? A big YES!

A fear of studying and dealing with mathematics exists in minds of all individuals. We dread mathematics. This subject trigger weird reactions from people. We do not understand the importance of mathematics in our daily lives. Human beings learn the significance of various issues when deprived of those things.

Hence imagine a world without mathematics and we’ll see if you still hate it.

Why Is Mathematics Important?

Mathematics plays an important role in disciplining your mental status and infuses logical reasoning which is essential in today’s world. With the help of mathematics, you have the answers to the question ‘how many’. We use simple concepts of mathematics in our daily life without realizing it. Now imagine using these concepts while having full information about them. 

Mathematics is a companion of mankind. Due to mathematics, we have rates, times, measurements, discounts, wage rates, taxes, forex, jobs, stocks, and much more. In the absence of such data, we will face a lot of chaos and confusion. Mathematics develops critical thinking skills. You can solve the Rubik’s cube with the knowledge of mathematics. You understand its different edges which allow you to make different permutations and combinations. Without mathematics never in your life, you could have solved a Rubik’s cube. 

Mathematics governs everything around us; it is a tool for global integration. It helps in generating logical, critical, problem-solving capabilities, communication skills, and creative thinking. Mathematics is everywhere, whether art, science, management, banking, finance, medicine, etc. While solving mathematics, different data is collected, studied, integrated, and decoded to form an opinion or take a decision.

• Mathematics helps in explaining how things work.
• It helps in finding logical explanations for various unexplained phenomena.
• Helps in developing intuition and wisdom.
• It can also be used as a monetary aspect by having a career as a professional mathematician or a teacher.
• It helps in foreign exchange and global import or export.
• Mathematics has a key role in financial markets, including trading in the CK market, cryptocurrency, blockchains, and other activities.
• It helps in developing and changing a young mind.

Even bees use geometry to make honey. They use hexagons to make their honeycombs. We can observe different rivers in the shape of pi. Mathematics is pervasive.

What If There Was No Mathematics?

Imagine a world where there is no mathematics around you. You would be happy for a split second there thinking how life would be easy without these tough and irritating calculations. But that’s not the case. 

Imagine playing games if there were no numbers, how to play sports without deciding who is the winner or loser. How difficult it would be for a teacher to prepare a scorecard for their students without having numbers? How to do major calculations without knowing prime and composite numbers?

What other consequences would you face? Let’s find out:

1. Finance- How would you manage your finances without numbers? You would ultimately overspend and face consequences. Managing your finances is an important life skill that requires basic addition and subtraction. Imagine how broke you would be without it.
2. Cooking and Baking- You might think a world without mathematics would have no impact on stuff like cooking and baking but that’s not the case. Baking requires having specific measurements to make your batter ferment in time. Similarly, while cooking you need your mathematics skills to understand how much quantity of ingredients is required.
3. Date and Time- Did you imagine a world without mathematics? Who would tell the time then? You’ll be late for every event. The word punctuality would lose its essence as nobody could tell the time. Even analogue clocks require a basic understanding of numbers. You would not be able to celebrate birthdays, or anniversaries, you wouldn’t know what year it is.
4. Aviation- Almost every field requires the use of mathematics but fields like aviation are strictly dependent on it. Pilots require a full fledge understanding of geometry and mathematical concepts to take decisions especially during taking off and landing. Imagine being on a plane where the pilot does not know mathematics, your fear of a plane crash might come true. Mathematics is required even during the fuel consumption of a plane.
5. Shopping- How would you shop for your basic necessity and even luxury items without knowing the cost, and quantity, finding discounts, and using percentages on various items? This would cause distress among the youth.
6. Construction- Mathematics also has a role in construction work. Builders require basic geometrical knowledge of how to make houses rectangular, buildings tall, and how to develop various infrastructures ensuring all the lengths and the breadths are equal to give a definite shape to their results. Without mathematics, you would see houses of weird and indefinite shapes which might be dangerous to live in.

Downfall Of Technology?

In a world without mathematics, high-end technologies and cell phones that you use in your daily life wouldn’t exist. Imagine living without any advancements in technology, without laptops, televisions, electricity, etc. Tough right?

The relationship between mathematics and technology is reciprocal. Both require each other to coexist in the universe. Learning various professional languages such as Java, C++, and coding would be impossible. Your life would be simple with no advancements. An application like excel has a very important role in the corporate world.

Now imagine using excel without having any prior knowledge of mathematical formulas. The struggle! Recording all the repetitive tasks manually would make people go crazy.

We hear about various unbelievable inventions every day. Mathematics is invented and so are the inventions. These inventions are possible only due to the concepts of mathematics. It is evident that scientists, engineers, researchers, etc. use their expertise in mathematics and combine it with their innovative ideas to produce an organized, systematic, and transmittable invention.

We talk about Artificial Intelligence (AI) will dominate the world, and how it would make manual labour easy, however, without mathematics, there would be no AI. Virtual and automated reality wouldn’t exist. Proficiency in concepts like derivatives and calculus is imperative for the development of AI.

We would simply be clueless without such electronic devices which have become a part of our lives. Thus, technology and mathematics go hand in hand.

Will Education Be Affected Without Mathematics?

Of course, it would be affected. There would be no examinations, no way to prepare a scorecard, and no math, physics, or chemistry. For a split second, there would be a wide grin on your face but think about it more maturely. Do you think you would be able to read this article on your device without exams, results, or education?

With time every student becomes more well-learned and proficient in life. Now without much knowledge of mathematics, everyone would end up illiterate. It would lead to the downfall of the economy, its GDP, and the country.

Mathematics helps in developing critical thinking skills in the minds of young children. It makes practical knowledge easier for them to understand. Mathematical literacy is known to infuse quantitative reasoning, computation skills, etc. Mathematics forms the basis for all the other subjects and is used in almost every field.

Mathematics is avoided by students only because of its tough curriculum. Do these tests’ score matter? No, it’s the education behind it that matters.

Sports Without Mathematics

Imagine watching a sport without knowing who is going to win. Usually, when you watch sports with your friends or family, you start predicting who is going to win by their scores. Now without mathematics, these scores wouldn’t exist. How will you make your predictions then? What purpose of watching a sport would be left if you aren’t able to tell the scores?

Not only this, but every sport also requires a specific dimension of area to play. For example, cricket is played on an oval-shaped field, a rectangular field is used for tennis and table tennis, a circular field for golf, and various other shapes of fields are used for different types of sports. Along with this, every sport has the dimensions of its field. All these measurements are possible to calculate today only because of mathematics. Without mathematics, it would simply be someone throwing a ball in an indefinite field without dimensions and the ball is bouncing in a completely different direction.

 Also, the time estimates for every sport are possible due to mathematics. No one would be able to calculate the duration of the sport. It could go on for a full day or thirty minutes you will never know. In such a scenario, every game would become boring. Thus, mathematics has an immense role in all sporting activities.

Economic Sector Without Mathematics

We know that the financial sector is deeply affiliated with mathematics, and it would simply not survive without it but what about the economics sector? Will this sector function normally without mathematics?

The idea might seem appealing, but it doesn’t add up. Policymakers require mathematics to make different policies for the economy keeping in mind different populations. GDP growth indicators, deflators, etc., all are based on mathematical concepts. Imagine an economy where you have no clue where your country stands. What kind of developments it requires and what kind of progress it has made?

Economics involves analyzing qualitative and quantitative aspects of an economy. Without mathematics how would we measure things under the qualitative aspect? Different economic models have different mathematical equations. Various Nobel Laureates used several mathematical equations in their models.

Economics also deals with the import and export of foreign goods. How will we continue this process without being able to set a foreign exchange rate? How will we calculate currency appreciation or depreciation or balance of trade? This would lead to the great depression of the economy as goods would be sold at random prices and different traders would be cheated.

Many crucial aspects of the economic system such as optimization and approximation could be solved only with the help of mathematics. Without mathematics, you would not be able to analyze the monetary system of the economy. The barter system will still prevail where you might sell your shares in some big company in exchange for wheat or rice. Envision this situation, where you are losing your shares which might give you twice the return in exchange for your necessities. Hence now we understand we cannot propel forward without mathematics.

Mathematics Can Make You Popular!

Sounds too nerdy. Well, it’s not. Think about how embarrassing it becomes when you go out with your friends or family and are not able to divide the bill mentally. Whilst you are taking out your cell phone to open the calculator someone already did the mental mathematics and is ready with the price per person.

Your knowledge of fractions could help in diving a pizza among a few people. Decimals could help you in analyzing what be a price of a foreign currency in Indian currency.  Mathematics can help you quickly calculate percentages or discounted prices of various items and determine that all the taxes have been correctly charged. That you are not being overcharged.

You don’t need exceptional expertise in mathematics to make such calculations which are essential in our daily lives. Not only your skill in mathematics makes you a smart person, but it also makes you street-smart.

There is a misconception that having significant knowledge of mathematics makes you nerdy and a geek. However, it only makes you smart and ready for the actual world.

Conclusion

Mathematics was invented to make our lives easier not more difficult. Mathematics is a universal language. It is so much more than numbers, fractions, decimals, and some Greek letters. Mathematics is the only language that is used universally. You do not need an understanding of any other language to recognize mathematics. Equations remain the same all over the world. They do not change with region or continent. It is a universal application that makes mathematics an essential life skill.

Without mathematics, we could not be able to explore the world that we have now. The laws of mathematics are evident and imagining a life without it would be precarious. You would still be using keypad phones, there would be a huge amount of unemployment, there would be no progress and the world would come to a standstill.

So, the next time you are using a car or handling money, analyzing your budget, watching TV, or playing sports, stop and appreciate the world of mathematics. Every sector in the world deals in mathematics. Thus, it is either now or never that you accept the world of mathematics and start living in it.

It is empowering and encouraging to live in a world where we can learn such mathematics that helps make sense of the life, we are living which often sometimes becomes senseless.