
Why Asians are Often Better at Math - tylermenezes
http://blog.studentrnd.org/post/37455656817/why-asians-are-better-than-americans-at-math
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rayiner
I'm not quite sure why my comment about asian parents hitting their kids when
they don't learn their math was deleted. The culture of corporal punishment in
asia is totally different, and the ends to which it is used is totally
different. There is a lot more riding on asian kids getting good at math than
for american kids.

Does it help delicate western sensibilities if I point out I'm asian?

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w1ntermute
This is bullshit. The first example with memorizing the numbers doesn't work
with Japanese - "hachi, ni, yon, roku, shichi, go, ichi" isn't faster than
"eight, two, four, six, seven, five, one", but the Japanese are no different
from the Chinese when it comes to their math prowess.

I don't understand why it's so hard for Americans to admit that Asian success
in areas like math is simply because _they work harder at it_. In Asian
cultures, there's a belief that your success is dependent on how _hard_ you
work, not your innate "intelligence". In America, if a child does well in
school, he gets told over and over that he's smart, while a child who doesn't
do well is told he's stupid. In Asia, if a child does well, he's told that he
did a good job studying hard, while those who don't do well are told to try
harder.

~~~
mistercow
> "hachi, ni, yon, roku, shichi, go, ichi" isn't faster than "eight, two,
> four, six, seven, five, one"

Japanese has two sets of numbers. One is the one you gave, which is based on
Japanese, and the other got imported along with kanji from China. Using the
shortest forms of the kun readings, it would be "ya, fu, yo, mu, na, i, hito".
I don't know if a typical Japanese speaker would memorize them that way, but
since those forms are ingrained in the language, they should be able to do so
without significant effort.

Now, to an English speaker, it may look like a wash; both appear to be strings
of eight syllables. But the kun-based numeral sounds are in fact quite a bit
faster.

~~~
w1ntermute
> One is the one you gave, which is based on Japanese, and the other got
> imported along with kanji from China.

Wrong. "hachi", "ni", "roku", "shichi", "go", and "ichi" are Chinese-origin
(on'yomi), not Japanese-origin (kun'yomi). The only number in my example that
is Japanese-origin is "yon"[0], which is interchangeable with "shi" (the
on'yomi equivalent) in many contexts.

> Using the shortest forms of the kun readings, it would be "ya, fu, yo, mu,
> na, i, hito".

Those readings are not used to count by native Japanese speakers (I speak
Japanese and have lived in Japan), and I can't think of any examples off the
top of my head where they would be used on their own.

> I don't know if a typical Japanese speaker would memorize them that way, but
> since those forms are ingrained in the language, they should be able to do
> so without significant effort.

They do not.

0:
[http://www.syvum.com/cgi/online/serve.cgi/squizzes/japanese/...](http://www.syvum.com/cgi/online/serve.cgi/squizzes/japanese/japanese_kanji_characters_3.html?table)

~~~
mistercow
My bad on flipping kun and on, but that doesn't change my point.

>Those readings are not used to count by native Japanese speakers (I speak
Japanese and have lived in Japan) ... They do not.

Have you asked a native speaker? Speaking Japanese as a second language is not
the same as speaking it natively, so unless you have discussed this with a
native speaker, I don't think that's a sufficient credential.

~~~
w1ntermute
> Have you asked a native speaker?

Yes. I have been taught how to count correctly in Japanese in a college class
by native Japanese instructors with graduate degrees in the instruction of
Japanese to foreign learners.

And as for my experience not being "a sufficient credential", I don't think
you realize (and I really do mean this in the nicest way possible) how
ridiculously absurd your suggestion that anyone counts "eight, two, four, six,
seven, five, one" as "ya, fu, yo, mu, na, i, hito" in Japanese sounds. It can
be considered (very) roughly equivalent to suggesting that English speakers
would memorize numbers using Latin or Greek prefixes.

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Jimmy
Interesting, but your ability to memorize sequences of numbers is almost
completely irrelevant to your ability to do higher-level math, and the
hypothesis that memorization "compounds into more knowledge and better math
skills for these Chinese children" is shaky at best. Also, the statement
"Asians are better than Americans at math" needs some qualification. Most of
the world's best mathematicians come from either the USA or Europe (although
there are of course many talented Asian mathematicians, like Tao, Mochizuki,
etc).

~~~
mistercow
>Interesting, but your ability to memorize sequences of numbers is almost
completely irrelevant to your ability to do higher-level math

Your digit span _does_ affect your ability to do mental arithmetic, and mental
arithmetic is an indispensable tool when meditating on equations and
algorithms so that you can understand their behavior.

~~~
karamazov
Mental arithmetic is not that useful in higher math - past calculus you're
more likely to use letters than numbers, and in many cases you're not working
directly with numbers anyway.

~~~
mistercow
I don't think when people say "Asians are often better at math", that they are
talking about post-calculus.

~~~
rdl
I think they mean algebra and higher, not arithmetic. So basically junior high
school and better. Even algebra doesn't benefit that much from simple counting
and arithmetic.

"Good at math" means different things based on age, but an adult who is good
at adding numbers and doing percentages is probably at a supermarket or a
waiter, or MAYBE a bookkeeper or a baseball fan, not a "good at math" engineer
or scientist. I don't think people are complaining that Asians are taking all
the valuable service industry jobs adding prices and computing tips in their
heads.

I always found more (Russian) jews in upper level math classes than Asians,
though. The most-Asian major at MIT was "anything plausibly pre-med", like
bio, chem, or chem-eng. 8 and 18 were mostly Jewish, mostly non-US origin.

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gvb
Ironically, French tend to be good at math (they told me so when I was over
there). Zero through 69 uses forms similar to counting in English (inferior to
Chinese per the OP), and then it goes all wonky. 70 is sixty-ten, 71 is sixty-
eleven,... but then 80 is four-twenty, and then 90 is four-twenty-ten,
-eleven,... Ouch!

The rational is that they get very good at adding, multiplying, and then
simplifying funky numbers in their heads (e.g. 73 + 92 would be sixty-eleven +
four-twenty-twelve = hundred-sixty-five). Or maybe they get really good at
memorizing addition tables, which would enhance their memorization skills. Or
maybe they were just bragging over beer (good beer, excellent wine, très bon
food ;-).

Ref:

<http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/ss/numbers_3.htm>

<http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/ss/numbers_4.htm>

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EdJiang
I was kinda skeptical as well, because I actually don't speak much Chinese
(even though I learned it at a young age), so I think in English, yet I was
very good at math in HS (competitive).

Yet, looking back, I realized that I did think of numbers like "four two"
instead of "forty two", so doing calculations like "[four | two] plus [two |
eight] equals [six | ten] -> 70". Hence, faster.

It’s actually interesting — I kind of see this article as more of an analogy.
I'm don't think it's the main cause of a performance gap, but it definitely
could contribute.

Imagine: what if this article was about developing a typical business app with
C# vs. C++ — instead of “you can count from 0-10 faster”, it’s “you can
manipulate strings faster” (measured in dev time, not CPU cycles).

Developers will switch to newer languages that make it more efficient. Eg,
Paul Graham's arguments about how LISP made Viaweb successful.

So, I'm curious. Developers will switch languages because they're more
efficient and expressive. But it's hard to switch languages. Not impossible,
though.

Will English evolve to become more efficient over time? Or will we all switch
to a newer language because it's more efficient?

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mistercow
Based on this concept, I've created a base-100 number system that encodes each
digit into a single simple syllable which is designed so that they can be
strung into unambiguous sequences. So if your mental phonological loop can
hold 10 fast syllables, you can hold the equivalent of 20 decimal digits in
this system.

The system is logically arranged so it's pretty easy to memorize, and since
it's base 100, the conversion to and from decimal is simple. The next step
after is to memorize the addition and multiplication tables using them, which
are of course much larger than in base 10. Once those become second nature, it
should be possible to do mental arithmetic more quickly and with more mental
registers to work with for larger numbers. I'm not nearly to that point yet,
but it's a fun experiment.

If people are interested, I can toss what I have up on github and write up a
detailed explanation of the system. So far, I have a few little HTML5 drills
for learning to convert, and an Anki deck for the addition tables.

~~~
damianpeckett
Now that does sound intriguing.

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ttflee
Shouldn't the title be revised as 'Why Asians are Often Better at Arithmatic'?

BTW, the way to read out equations and expressions of algebra and calculus
feels to me a little alien in Chinese. The English version feels OK.

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thingummywut
What about Asians in the US that speak English?

Title should include "Chinese" not "Asian". The article only references
Chinese.

How does pronouncing numbers help with anything more complex than counting?

~~~
tazzy531
Most Asian counting systems are similar to the Chinese.

>How does pronouncing numbers help with anything more complex than counting?
Majority of the population don't use much beyond very basic math. The ability
to do simple arithmetic on a day to day basis for most is an important skill
to have.

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jopt
Wild speculation.

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mavlee
I've seen this argument come up from time to time in blogs and newspapers, but
I don't buy it.

While I agree that this may allow for Asian students to do basic arithmetic
slightly faster at a younger age, learning concepts such as a geometry, linear
algebra or calculus do not depend on my ability to count.

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diminoten
Bill Burr has a comedy bit about exactly this, I was just watching it on
Netflix.

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maxwin
This is kind of true. In my freshman year, I didn't even use calculator for my
calculus class. However, for highly abstract math, I don't think I have an
advantage.

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dchichkov
Well, <http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0923110.html>

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jinushaun
Not all Asians are Chinese. It's not a mystery. It's tiger parenting, which
Western culture lacks.

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thuffy
Let's be frank here:

Now I am Christian, but also being an evolutionist, even I can see the truth
here:

North Asians are better at math than Europeans due to greater than two
thousand years of Christian dysgenics.

~~~
rdl
What exactly do you mean?

