Suckin' at math? Yes, I can !
At over 50 years old, I decided to write this text because I was fed up with not having my say, or at least not recognizing myself in some piece of writing, interview or survey about maths and the disenchantment with it. Because every time it's discussed in the media, the latest Nobel Prize winner or the university professor who's just proved the theorem on which generations of mathematicians have chewed their teeth is called up.
And the guy appears on TV or the Internet, a bit hallucinated, his eyes full of the beneficial light of mastered knowledge, to explain what a shame it is that maths is so unpopular in our country, given that it really is THE fantastic world of all possibilities, that it's a subtle, gratifying, amusing game of the mind and blah, blah, blah. You, who haven't even glimpsed any of this in your life, you listen, to have a look, to try for the umpteenth time to understand. And it always goes wrong at the same point: when the guy gives an example that's supposed to demonstrate to everyone what he's just said. Whatever mathematical subject he's tackling, whatever example he's using, in half a sentence he's lost you. For one simple reason: he's in and you're outside.
It doesn't take long for you to realize that, however well-intentioned he may be, he's only talking to people who have already assimilated a certain number of notions that will enable them to stick with him. You're out of the game from the very first sentence, and he only convinces the convinced. The guy does his open, passionate, popularizing scientist act, then goes back to his work. No one, never once, gives a voice to the outsiders. Better still, no one invites them to express their opposing views. It's as if being bad at maths or not understanding anything about it were a disgrace (it undeniably is), which you couldn't do anything about, like a club foot, a congenital condition, you either have it or you don't, and that's that! In any case, the interviewer, himself more or less out of touch, generally avoids going any further, simply nodding and chanting the interview with admiring exclamations.
One or two reports on a school or two that are trying a different kind of approach to teaching, and everyone goes home reassured that they've helped fix the situation. Chimeras. So I modestly tried to look into my mathematical misadventure, to untangle the threads, to find explanations, and what I came up with literally pissed me off.
About... me
Before I get to the heart of the subject, I'd like to tell you a bit about myself. Because, well, I'm not just a victim, I'm also partly responsible for this wreck. For a start, I don't have a vivid imagination, I don't have extraordinary dreams, I also don't have nightmares and, in any case, even if I do, I don't remember them, which comes down to the same thing. I have a reputation for being down-to-earth, but I'm not very analytical either: I have trouble instantly deciphering what's happening or being said in front of me, what's going on behind what's being said. I understand very well, but I don't analyze in real time, I don't deduce. In short, I understand, but I need time to detail, weigh and draw conclusions.
I'm the kind of guy who can think of a hundred ways, each one more refined than the last, that he could have sent into his interlocutor's teeth if only he'd had the wit. But right now you're in the subway, man, the guy's already gone home and you know where you can stick your wacky repartee?
I have trouble with mental representations too: every time I hear a “good maths student” talk about his relationship with maths, he says that he sees figures, curves and objects "in his head". That's where I get stuck. It brings up absolutely nothing for me. I have no real-life experience that could serve as a reference on the matter. It's simple: I can't see anything and I've never seen anything "in my head" when I look at a mathematical formula. I've never had a figure in front of, or rather just behind, my eyes, in my brain, before I've even (badly) drawn it.
I've always been blown away by people who are able to buy a ruin because they saw its potential, what they could do with it. I see what's in front of my eyes: a ruin, a pile of shit, a chaos of bricks and mortar that exhausts me just looking at it... Don't bother talking to me about earthworks, load-bearing walls, rendering, decoration, bay windows, I just see what's in front of my eyes: rocks! The same goes for house plans: I'm absolutely unable to imagine the rooms and layout of the place. I see straight lines, others curved, doors and windows look like pie charts; so at best I imagine a box of Vache qui rit, a cheese box, something not very exciting in short. The same vaguely suspicious astonishment when one of my architect buddies explained to me that as soon as he laid eyes on a plan, he could see the rooms taking shape, in volume. Science fiction, man! Mythomaniac!
And I'm not even talking about creative titans like Peter Stuyvesant. Guys show up at a place, there's nothing there! Not a moped! Yes, there's usually a river. You see a river, you dip your toes, you make ricochets and if you're feeling adventurous, you fish. But here, the good man is haranguing the others: “My friends... My friends... This is where we're going to build our city! He tells you this in the middle of a shitty clearing or at the top of a peeling hill, and the worst thing is, he's right!
Even when I'm reading a book, of course I get an idea of the characters, but it's all a blur: I have a vague idea of their build, maybe a hairstyle, but nothing precise. No facial features, no particular clothes, even, and almost especially, if the author has described them (apologies Honoré). And I'm not even talking about the places, which I don't imagine at all, or which are completely skewed and just serve as backdrops for the characters. Maps imagined by the author, same struggle (Dune, Lord of the Rings etc.). Worst of all, I'm able to tell you that the film based on the book doesn't match my own vision of it, and at the same time I'm unable to explain my view of the thing, which is too vague, too fleeting, too fragmented. So, there you have it: I have no visual imagination, no inclination to project an inner cinema, I draw like crap, I only see what I see, and I'm well aware that I don't see everything either...
