What Maths Really IS!

Mathematics is not adding, subtracting, dividing or multiplying. In grade school I remember their was too great an emphasis on this sort of stuff, it was boring and nobody really liked it. As I grew up however I began to realize that it is A LOT more than just simple functions, more than trigonometry, more than geometry, more than algebra, and more than calculus. It is the study of observation. It is the ability to make connections about the things around you and assign values to them and understand how these things will react quantitatively. Real Math is fun! The books that we get and read in school are not Mathematics, though they may help us learn how to observe the world around them their contents, being a bunch of exercises in not real Mathematics (for you english majors that are catching onto the capitalized "M" in Mathematics I will tell you now that Mathematics is more of a language than verbal language will ever be). To all of you that are just beginning to participate in Math classes (or even those of you that have PhD's in several Mathematics concepts) understand that Math lives, breaths, and should not ever be given up on. A fundamental understanding of Mathematics is a entire understanding of the ways in which our observable world can be viewed. Never look at things one way or the way that a teacher tell you to. Discover! Be willing to try things that you think may work! And if your answer doesn't make sense take it to a teacher, then reflect. What prevented it from working? What law or rule was broken? If no rule was broken than it isn't likely that your answer is wrong. And never forget that the greatest Mathematics is discovered when new rules are made, rules that flow the laws of observation, such as Riemann's and Newton's great discoveries of Calculus. If you aren't having fun doing Math then you very simply are not doing it right.