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Singapore Math

Showing posts with label haiku. Show all posts
Showing posts with label haiku. Show all posts

Sunday, June 29, 2025

Does AI Sulk at Counting?

Six days ago, in the wee hours at a 24/7 neighborhood coffeeshop, I spotted the unsightly aftermath of a chain-smoker’s bad habit. Below is a shot of its dirty floor:



While sipping my tea, it crossed my mind to convert that Ugly Singaporean’s behavior into a math question in the form of a haiku.

I crafted the maiku tongue-in-cheek and X-ed the following:


The Ugly Singaporean

Migrant worker’s toil—

Count the butts strewn on the floor,

Shameful act exposed.


A few days later, for no reason, I was prompted to ask AI for the number of cigarette butts on the floor.

Below are the exchanges or arguments I had with my virtual math teacher.











At 26, I decided to end the conversation, albeit I believed that with some persuasion I’d have tricked AI to agree with me that the answer could be 10π.

Now, it’s your turn to tell us the exact number of butts, by outsmarting AI. What’s the correct answer?

Humanly yours

© Yan Kow Cheong, June 29, 2025.

Monday, October 14, 2024

Murderous Pi


Political Pi
 

When π thought that she’d never want to be associated with gun violence and senseless death, was she just being politically positive or naive?

Pi’s fear has now come true. Without repeated funding from gun manufacturers and pollution-enabled organizations, an obscene number of morally corrupt halfwitted lawmakers in TrumpLand would never get elected or reelected.

Even as you’re reading this, the odds of another senseless shooting or tragedy currently being witnessed in some red-pilled states are anything but zero.

It looks like if only those GOP selfish lawmakers and their loved ones or friends were the victims, maybe then they’d eventually do something about gun control; otherwise, it’s all NATO (No Action Talk Only).


Should Math Teachers Be Armed?

The Blame Game

People are sick of hearing the years-long canned story from inept and morally bankrupt politicians, who simplistically blame mental health, inequality, racism, or whatever social ills, rather than the free flow of guns for the recurring senseless deaths. It’s like the political equivalent of scapegoating the forced learning of algebra for the nation’s high innumeracy rate.

The U.S. is the only “civilized” nation in the developed world that has continually shortchanged its schoolchildren and their teachers. When profits and politicians triumph over principles and people.

Or, only in TrumpLand do we read about these senseless school gun deaths—when students shoot teachers and their peers because they can do it. And those preventable school shootings have only got more frequent and resulted in higher casualties in recent years.


Murderous Statistics

Below are some “murderous statistics” I’d tweeted over the years following numerous school shootings:

Sadistic Statistics from the National Rifle Association (NRA): “No guns, very high murder rates; more guns, very low murder rates.”

Murderous Math: People in the U.S. are 20 times more likely to be killed by a gun than someone else in another developed country.

Gun Ownership: Singapore ranks among the bottom 10 for the number of privately owned guns per 100 people.

It’s said that the chance of a 15-year-old boy dying by the age of 50 is now higher in America than it is in Bangladesh. The odds might even be higher now with Trumpism and moral bankruptcy plaguing Trumpublicans.

Deadly Statistics: The positive correlation between the coronavirus and the growing gun sales in the U.S., which has the highest crime rate in the developed world.


Dark Problem Solving

Ironically, school and gun shootings in the U.S. have provided math educators with real-life math problems, which could be used to hone students’ guesstimation skills. Two such questions are:

Political Math: Guesstimate how many “corrupt zeros” Trump and his billionaires-donors (and the mostly morally corrupt GOP lawmakers) pocketed, by protecting profiteering guns, insurance, and pharmaceutical companies.

Death Statistics: How many students in the U.S. senselessly die every year from gun violence?


No Gun Reduction, but God’s Protection


Let’s end with a haiku I recently X-ed in the aftermath of Trump’s lackey saying that school shootings are a “fact of life.”

Serial School Shootings

Money politics
that support gun businesses.
That’s a “fact of life.”


If the U.S. is dead serious about protecting schoolchildren and teachers from gun shootings, maybe it’d do it the Singapore way: Zero tolerance for gun sale to 99.99% locals. Vote out politicians who’re funded by weapon manufacturers.

Safely & securely yours

© Yan Kow Cheong, October 14, 2024.

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Mathematical Haikus for Kiasus

Some 17 odd hours ago, I posted "Mathematical Haikus for Goondus* and Suakus" on Facebook. I hypothesized that composing or formulating these 17-syllabled verses may help one to balance the left mathematical part with the often-atrophied right part of the brainHere's another lot of these 5-7-5-like crude non-seasonal poems.


Make Every Nanosecond Count

Three scores and ten
Roughly a billion heartbeats
Use your time wisely

How Many Misteaks Are There?

On the train platform
Train arriving in ''one mins''
That's non-SI time!

Issued by Japan in 1984 


Rightly Theirs
That kids can recall
Pythagorean Theorem
That proves their "math rights"





The Craze Is Back
http://www.rubiks.com

Dare to sign up for
Rubik's Cube Competition?
That's raw math talent! 


A Modern-day Rubik Cube

Sudoku, again?
Think of something more worthy
To tickle your brain

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifteen_puzzle



Sam Loyd’s Alleged Invention

That cheap toy of yesteryear
Order it on eBay




A Math Competition for All

AMC* is best
The most popular contest
In the world today

*Australian Mathematics Competition



Where Cool Math Things Happen

MAA is cool!
The association to be
For math geeks and nerds


The World's Most Disliked Subject

Why you dislike math?
MATH is a four-letter word
A turn-off for kids

A Key to Unlocking the Universe’s Secrets

Math is a language
With notations and notions
To model the world


Some Like It With an “S”

Is it MATH or MATHS?
It all depends where you live!
Your location counts.


Product Details


The Most Quoted Verse

What's John 3:16?
God's numerical message
Of His Love for you




NUMBERS 1:1-36:13 

The Book of Numbers
Is not really a math book
But God's Almanac! 



Social Media MATH

To blog or to tweet?
It's hard to make up my mind
I choose to do both

TWITTER Math

Micromath 4 U
In 140 words
To share your sweet tweets


FACEBOOK Math

Five-minute math posts
On pop culture and gossip
For friends, fiends, and foes


The Chewing Gum Land

A math sanctuary
The ''fine city'' Singapore
Offers jail and cane


Triple Firsts in TIMSS

SINgapore’s success?
A haven of ''cheat/cheap'' books
© Yan Kow Cheong, 2011

To meet kiasus’ needs


Superstitiously Yours 

Friday the 13th 
An urban myth to promote 
Irrational fear




Apocalypse now

Faith in the Mayas
Dec 21, 2012
Where will you be then?


Singapore’s Papyrus

The model method
A mere fad or a cool tool?
To soothe the mind's eye


Faith or Fear in 1’s and 2’s

The Y2K scare
Next it's 12/21/12
Marketing faux fear?


© 2012 Yan Kow Cheong

Another Creative Math Title

Cre8tively yours
Who Took My Calculator?
Coming your way soon!

It's time to compose a few mathematical haikus to tickle the right part of your grey matter. And remember to share them with the rest of the mathematical brethren.

A 17-letter 
m-a-t-h-e-m-a-t-i-c-a-l H-A-I-K-U
Longs to be composed

* Suakus and Goondus are the Asian equivalents of Dummies, Idiots, Blockheads, and Morons.
# Kiasus are those who are afraid to lose out, displaying signs of self-centeredness and selfishness.

© Yan Kow Cheong, July 10, 2011