Re: Excel Math Bug

From: Aristotle Polonium (eat_at_ickyfeces.com)
Date: 08/04/04 

Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 01:03:43 -0500

> SNIP
> something along those lines. No one seems to really have any good reason.
> SNIP

=================================================

The "good reason" has been posted.

Unfortunately, it has not yet been recognized.

Kevin O'Neill

=================================================

"fred" <fred@fred.frd> wrote in message news:ni_Pc.1586$1D4.418@fe1.columbus.rr.com...
> > <many good points snipped for brevity>
> >
> > Yeah, it's a convention, but there IS an established convention in math,
> > and it says -3^2 is -9. If Excel does it differently, they're using a
> > different convention --- and I can understand how that would happen, in
> > trying to remain compatible with older software. My guess is one of the
> > original spread*** authors screwed it up, and people have been trying to
> > maintain compatibility since then. Actually, I'm glad this came up --- the
> > stat people in our department were tossing around the idea of using Excel
> > in their courses instead of a stat package, but this is a reason for
> > rejecting that idea. If Excel doesn't follow such a standard mathematical
> > convention, I don't think I'd want students using it in our courses.
> >
> > Bruce I.
> >
>
> I'm the one who brought this up in the first place and although this
> discussion
> has been quite interesting I only draw from it that I was right in the first
> place. The normal chalkboard, or academic math convention has been deviated
> from. In my mind this is wrong. Some have given reasons for it like "since
> it's digital and it can't hold a reciprocal it has to be that way" or
> something along those lines. No one seems to really have any good reason.
> I'm sure it's as you say. The early coders just got it wrong and were kind
> of stuck with it for legacy reasons. Sort of like the Y2K situation a few
> years ago. Or the language applications just didn't feel it necessary to
> get the order right, it was enough to just explain in the reference manuals
> 'their' way of doing things.
>
> From my own development experience it's obvious to me that the reason many
> of these people are holding some position that "it's just fine", "that's the
> way it is", "user emptor", is that they don't have a lot of math experience.
> They are like the dozens (or hundred) of programmers I've known over the
> years who code up some screen or application that is totally unusable
> because they are making ridiculous assumptions about user expectations or
> user behavior. They're just coders and may be good at coding, but in the
> example at hand, a subtlety was missed.
>
> It's apparent now that many applications and/or languages don't use the
> standard math conventions. Why there are so many voices saying that's okay
> is mystifying. It's not okay. It's sad. But unfortunately that's what we
> are stuck with. It's somewhat understandable in a language, but Excel is
> more of an always-available do-everything super-calculator, not what I'd
> consider a language. It should conform.
>
> I agree with you, this is the last straw for me and I'm going to get some
> real math application -- maybe Mathematica. Excel is wonderful for many
> things -- charting, pivot tables, quick analyses -- and actually, I believe
> the spread*** in general was responsible in large part for the growth of
> PCs in the early years, but that is doesn't conform to academic math
> conventions is unfortunate, and this type of thing is endemic with
> consumer-grade software. Mathematica seems to be a serious,
> industrial-strength application developed especially for mathematicians.
> The $2000 it cost me to learn this lesson was far more than the $300 I was
> considering spending for Mathematica.
>
> Fred
>
>

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