LVI% of Americans Oppose Arabic Numerals

[toucana]

More than half of Americans believe “Arabic numerals” – the standard symbols used across much of the world to denote numbers – should not be taught in school, according to a survey.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/arabic-numerals-survey-prejudice-bias-survey-research-civic-science-a8918256.html

Fifty-six per cent of people say the numerals should not part of the curriculum for US pupils, according to research designed to explore the bias and prejudice of poll respondents.

A survey by Civic Science, an American market research company, asked 3,624 respondents: “Should schools in America teach Arabic numerals as part of their curriculum?” The poll did not explain what the term “Arabic numerals” meant.

Some 2,020 people answered “no”. Twenty-nine per cent of respondents said the numerals should be taught in US schools and 15 per cent had no opinion - (or asked “what is a numeral?”)

John Dick, chief executive of Civic Science, said the results were “the saddest and funniest testament to American bigotry we’ve ever seen in our data”.

[Forest_Dump]

That is funny but sadly not all that surprising

[BadgerJelly]

I honestly had no idea. I call them Roman Numerals. If someone had asked that question, and stated that they were called Arabic Numerals too, the response would be different.

Just another nonsense survey to push some nonsense position no doubt.

[Lomax]

I honestly had no idea. I call them Roman Numerals. If someone had asked that question, and stated that they were called Arabic Numerals too, the response would be different.

Roman numerals: I, V, X, L, C, D, M
Arabic numerals: 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9

[toucana]

Modern Egyptian numerical phone keypad layout

The familiar western numeral system was originally known as the 'Hindu numeral system' because it was originally developed by Indian mathematicians between the 1st and 4th centuries AD.

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/waymakermath4libarts/chapter/the-hindu-arabic-number-system/

The 'Arabic' tag arose in the 9th century AD at a time when the newly founded Abbasid Caliphate based in Damascus was pursuing a program of rapid territorial expansion, but was also actively seeking out new philosophical and mathematical knowledge from the scholars of the areas they were exploring. (This included India, Persia Greece and China.)

It was the writings of two Arabic speaking scholars al-Khwarizmi and al-Kindi around 830 AD that first introduced the Hindu-Arabic number system to European mathematicians. Their Arabic writings were translated into Latin, and then disseminated by scholars living in southern Spain which was largely controlled by Muslim rulers at that time.

The modern Arabic numeral system has evolved from, and differs in some respects from the one adopted by European scholars. (See the image of a modern Egyptian telephone keyboard layout above).

[BadgerJelly]

I honestly had no idea. I call them Roman Numerals. If someone had asked that question, and stated that they were called Arabic Numerals too, the response would be different.

Roman numerals: I, V, X, L, C, D, M
Arabic numerals: 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9

Oh! I had no idea ... obviously :D

I’d probably read it somewhere though and forgotten about it. I know “algebra” is Arabic at least.

[TheVat]

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... redirect=1

It's that zero that really made the system such a great advancement of math.

My guess is that the poll result is not due to bigotry so much as not understanding what was meant by Arabic numbers, i.e. our declining educational systems. As the article indicated, the poll did not explain the term. No doubt many respondents thought the proposal was to teach students to make those calligraphic squiggles that the Arabic language uses. Yes, they're idiots. So what else is new?

[BadgerJelly]

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/history-of-zero/?redirect=1

It's that zero that really made the system such a great advancement of math.

My guess is that the poll result is not due to bigotry so much as not understanding what was meant by Arabic numbers, i.e. our declining educational systems. As the article indicated, the poll did not explain the term. No doubt many respondents thought the proposal was to teach students to make those calligraphic squiggles that the Arabic language uses. Yes, they're idiots. So what else is new?

The people who made the poll are idiots or looking to make out people are ‘bigots’ because they assume that learning Arabic numbers meant learning Arabic script (be fair, it’s not exactly illogical). I think it is idiotic to suggest that not knowing this is a decline in education? Seriously? Should we also regard people idiotic if they don’t know what cuneiform is? I don’t see the difference.

It is clear enough what the intent was. It’s sick.

[Lomax]

Perhaps we need a control study to determine how many people oppose the teaching of Roman numerals. Is it the Arabic expanse these people are opposed to, or merely education?

[toucana]

Perhaps I should have added this quote from the end of the source article cited in the OP:

Seventy-two per cent of Republican-supporting respondents said Arabic numerals should not be on the curriculum, compared with 40 per cent of Democrats. This was despite there being no significant difference in education between the two groups.

“They answer differently even though they had equal knowledge of our numerical nomenclature,” Mr Dick said. “It means that the question is about knowledge or ignorance but [also] something else – prejudice.”

I was taught what Roman numerals were, and how to count using the Roman system in junior preparatory school here in UK - i.e. when I was about eight years old. Right around the time I began learning classical Latin (and Greek too).

To this very day, the BBC still use the Roman numeral system to define the date of all their programs in their production credits. What on earth do you imagine the omnipresent logo MMXIX found on all new BBC programs stands for. The initials of the director ?

[TheVat]

Seventy-two per cent of Republican-supporting respondents said Arabic numerals should not be on the curriculum, compared with 40 per cent of Democrats. This was despite there being no significant difference in education between the two groups.

I think there's a difference, possibly not measured by their metrics for education, between GOP and Dems, in terms of how certain concepts are absorbed in a classroom and reinforced at home and in peer groups. And that may affect comprehension of the phrase "Arabic numerals." Is it possible some GOP respondents actually are thinking "Arabs invented our system of cardinal numbers, so we'd better stop using them" ? Maybe a few, but I think we'd need more nuanced poll questions to determine how many really have such an absurd bias. We're talking a level of logic on the order of "Let's not allow Persian carpets - their motifs originally came from where Iran is presently located."

[TheVat]

At my high school, some Latin students once graffiti'd "Suck our 509" on a school bus. Sorry to report that very few got the joke.

[Serpent]

At my high school, some Latin students once graffiti'd "Suck our 509" on a school bus. Sorry to report that very few got the joke.

*
Really? you'd think from context alone.... And that's not a very recent result of Republican state governments cutting funds for public schools.
I don't think it's the poll that needs to be ashamed of itself; it illustrates
Poor Education X Systemic Prejudice = a Very Ill-prepared Population for any challenges

(I multiplied, rather than adding, because they reinforce each other... and I don't know how to denote exponents; couldn't be on time for early-morning math class and got tossed)

*don't they always, the supercilious little 509ns?

[dandelion]

There are l l types of people, those who know Roman Numerals and those who don't.