this post was submitted on 31 May 2025
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A fake Facebook event disguised as a math problem has been one of its top posts for 6 months (www.engadget.com)
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[–] HereIAm@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago (41 children)

The issue normally with these "trick" questions is the ambiguous nature of that division sign (not so much a problem here) or people not knowing to just go left to right when all operators are of the same priority. A common mistake is to think division is prioritised above multiplication, when it actually has the same priority. Someone should have included some parenthesis in PEDMAS aka. PE(DM)(AS) 😄

[–] vithigar@lemmy.ca 6 points 2 months ago (35 children)

The same priority operations can be done in any order without affecting the result, that's why they can be same priority and don't need an explicit order.

6 × 4 ÷ 2 × 3 ÷ 9 evaluates the same regardless of order. Can you provide a counter example?

[–] HereIAm@lemmy.world 5 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (27 children)

So let's try out some different prioritization systems.

Left to right:

(((6 * 4) / 2) * 3) / 9
((24 / 2) * 3) / 9
(12 * 3) / 9
36 / 9 = 4

Right to left:

6 * (4 / (2 * (3 / 9)))  
6 * (4 / (2 * 0.333...))  
6 * (4 / 0.666...)  
6 * 6 = 36

Multiplication first:

(6 * 4) / (2 * 3) / 9  
24 / 6 / 9

Here the path divides again, we can do the left division or right division first.

Left first: 
(24 / 6) / 9  
4 / 9 = 0.444...

Right side first:  
24 / (6 / 9)  
24 / 0.666... = 36

And finally division first:

6 * (4 / 2) * (3 / 9)  
6 * 2 * 0.333...  
12 * 0.333.. = 4

It's ambiguous which one of these is correct. Hence the best method we have for "correct" is left to right.

[–] SmartmanApps@programming.dev 0 points 1 month ago

Right to left:

6 * (4 / (2 * (3 / 9)))

Nope! 6 × 4 ÷ 2 × 3 ÷ 9 =4 right to left is 6 ÷ 9 x 3 ÷ 2 × 4 =4. You disobeyed the rule of Left Associativity, and your answer is wrong

Multiplication first: (6 * 4) / (2 * 3) / 9

Also nope. Multiplication first is 6 x 4 x 3 ÷ 2 ÷ 9 =4

Left first: (24 / 6) / 9

Still nope. 6 × 4 x 3 ÷ 2 ÷ 9 =4

Right side first: 24 / (6 / 9)

Still nope. 6 × 4 x 3 ÷ 9 ÷ 2 =4

And finally division first: 6 * (4 / 2) * (3 / 9)

And finally still nope. 6 ÷ 9 ÷ 2 x 4 x 3 =4

Hint: note that I never once added any brackets. You did, hence your multiple wrong answers.

It’s ambiguous which one of these is correct

No it isn't. Only 4 is correct, as I have just shown repeatedly.

Hence the best method we have for “correct” is left to right

It's because students don't make mistakes with signs if you don't change the order. I just showed you can still get the correct answer with different orders, but you have to make sure you obey Left Associativity at every step.

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