5 ms·

Well I guess you could write sum() instead of Σ, and dot() instead of ·, but I’m not sure it would really help people understand it. Do people find Mathematica

Well I guess you could write sum() instead of Σ, and dot() instead of ·, but I’m not sure it would really help people understand it. Do people find Mathematica expressions easier to understand than traditionally formatted equations?

squeaky-clean 9y ago
The reason I personally prefer sum() to Σ is I can google "what is a sum". If I Google "what is Σ" I get answers about the greek letter Sigma. If I Google "what is Σ math" it incorrectly says "Standard Deviation". Also if I don't know what Sigma is, it's very hard to ask someone else what the weird uppercase E means.
- Cozumel 9y ago
  Search engine that focuses on symbols: http://symbolhound.com/ http://symbolhound.com/
- njarboe 9y ago
  Putting in "what does the symbol sigma mean" into google (incognito mode) gives the google blurb of: "In addition to being the 18th letter of the Greek alphabet, sigma also means 'sum' and 'deviation' in the mathematics world. Learn what each symbol looks like and how each formula works." It first hit is titled,"Sigma Notation - Math is Fun", with the text 'Sigma Notation. Σ This symbol (called Sigma) means "sum up"' I think learning the names of the Greek letters is not too high a bar to get started on learning physics and math. Fun too. You really need to know the names of things to start to understand them and ask people about them. I think the reason people like compact formulas is that it is much easier to understand and check a formula if one can have the whole thing in eyes view.
  - squeaky-clean 9y ago
    That's part of my point though. You had to know Σ means sigma to search that in the first place. If you search "what does Σ mean" or "what does symbol Σ mean" you get answers for lowercase sigma saying standard deviation. At the very least it means it takes 2 searches, one to find the name of a symbol, and a second to search using that, sometimes I can't do that if the notation is an image of TeX output. Then it becomes "what does box symbol with line through it mean" or something. Thankfully StackExchange now renders math notation in a way that can be copy pasted, but still, here's an example I was reading recently that started as an ascii email chain and moved to stackexchange, I feel like it was more easily readable before. It's still tough to Google that Π(u) is the same as the rect() function https://dsp.stackexchange.com/questions/42495/implication-of-sampling-and-reconstruction-theorem https://dsp.stackexchange.com/questions/42495/implication-of... > I think learning the names of the Greek letters is not too high a bar to get started on learning physics and math. But the original point was that for someone who doesn't know math, writing it in a more english-like notation wouldn't be helpful. But because of search engines it is.
- klipt 9y ago
  "Standard Deviation" is not incorrect, statistics is a branch of math.
  - pps43 9y ago
    Standard deviation is lowercase sigma, sum is uppercase sigma. They are not the same.
    - klipt 9y ago
      Uppercase sigma is used for multivariate distributions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multivariate_normal_distribution#Notation_and_parametrization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multivariate_normal_distributi...
      - pps43 9y ago
        But this is not common. If you don't know what uppercase sigma refers to, sum is a much better guess than standard deviation of multivatiate normal distribution. In this case google is probably simply case insensitive.
- nnfy 9y ago
  It pains me to see how normal it has become to search using unrelated words, I.e. "what" and "is". I still can't get over the fact that google removed advanced search syntax.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    Kind of makes sense if you're trying to make your search query match a stackoverflow question... Though AFAIK Google ignores those common words anyway.
  - squeaky-clean 9y ago
    You do get different (and better) results if you search "What is Σ" rather than "why is Σ" or just "Σ". Like the other commenter said, it's better when you'd rather find a forum or SO post matching that title, rather than getting back Google's own answer.
    - nnfy 9y ago
      I dont think you and the other response understand. Google used to conduct a relatively straightforward string matching search. That means if you used words like "what" you could end up with unrelated matches, or lower quality matches, because they would match with the word "what". Now, bear with me, these days google seems to use some kind if machine learning to suggest results to you based on what others have searched and chosen. What does this mean, practically? At least two things: 1.Laymen have to think less critically, less technically when searching. Considering google is, for the average person, basically the window to knowledge, I think this is ultimately a disservice to society. 2. Search quality for technical information seems to be declining, now that laymen and non-laymen alike are searching using the same " extra" words and, I may just be projecting a poor understanding of neural nets here, but our technical results end up getting sort of clustered with everything else. Am I the only one who has this problem with the decline of google search's technical relevance? Maybe I'm doing something wrong...I still think what google has done to make the internet more accessible may be a net harm to society.
      - 9y ago
vthriller 9y ago
not to mention that sum() or forall() might mean nothing to people who don't speak English, so for them those would just be another set of things to memorize anyway

squeaky-clean 9y ago

The reason I personally prefer sum() to Σ is I can google "what is a sum". If I Google "what is Σ" I get answers about the greek letter Sigma. If I Google "what is Σ math" it incorrectly says "Standard Deviation". Also if I don't know what Sigma is, it's very hard to ask someone else what the weird uppercase E means.

Cozumel 9y ago
Search engine that focuses on symbols: http://symbolhound.com/ http://symbolhound.com/
njarboe 9y ago
Putting in "what does the symbol sigma mean" into google (incognito mode) gives the google blurb of: "In addition to being the 18th letter of the Greek alphabet, sigma also means 'sum' and 'deviation' in the mathematics world. Learn what each symbol looks like and how each formula works." It first hit is titled,"Sigma Notation - Math is Fun", with the text 'Sigma Notation. Σ This symbol (called Sigma) means "sum up"' I think learning the names of the Greek letters is not too high a bar to get started on learning physics and math. Fun too. You really need to know the names of things to start to understand them and ask people about them. I think the reason people like compact formulas is that it is much easier to understand and check a formula if one can have the whole thing in eyes view.
- squeaky-clean 9y ago
  That's part of my point though. You had to know Σ means sigma to search that in the first place. If you search "what does Σ mean" or "what does symbol Σ mean" you get answers for lowercase sigma saying standard deviation. At the very least it means it takes 2 searches, one to find the name of a symbol, and a second to search using that, sometimes I can't do that if the notation is an image of TeX output. Then it becomes "what does box symbol with line through it mean" or something. Thankfully StackExchange now renders math notation in a way that can be copy pasted, but still, here's an example I was reading recently that started as an ascii email chain and moved to stackexchange, I feel like it was more easily readable before. It's still tough to Google that Π(u) is the same as the rect() function https://dsp.stackexchange.com/questions/42495/implication-of-sampling-and-reconstruction-theorem https://dsp.stackexchange.com/questions/42495/implication-of... > I think learning the names of the Greek letters is not too high a bar to get started on learning physics and math. But the original point was that for someone who doesn't know math, writing it in a more english-like notation wouldn't be helpful. But because of search engines it is.
klipt 9y ago
"Standard Deviation" is not incorrect, statistics is a branch of math.
- pps43 9y ago
  Standard deviation is lowercase sigma, sum is uppercase sigma. They are not the same.
  - klipt 9y ago
    Uppercase sigma is used for multivariate distributions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multivariate_normal_distribution#Notation_and_parametrization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multivariate_normal_distributi...
    - pps43 9y ago
      But this is not common. If you don't know what uppercase sigma refers to, sum is a much better guess than standard deviation of multivatiate normal distribution. In this case google is probably simply case insensitive.
nnfy 9y ago
It pains me to see how normal it has become to search using unrelated words, I.e. "what" and "is". I still can't get over the fact that google removed advanced search syntax.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Kind of makes sense if you're trying to make your search query match a stackoverflow question... Though AFAIK Google ignores those common words anyway.
- squeaky-clean 9y ago
  You do get different (and better) results if you search "What is Σ" rather than "why is Σ" or just "Σ". Like the other commenter said, it's better when you'd rather find a forum or SO post matching that title, rather than getting back Google's own answer.
  - nnfy 9y ago
    I dont think you and the other response understand. Google used to conduct a relatively straightforward string matching search. That means if you used words like "what" you could end up with unrelated matches, or lower quality matches, because they would match with the word "what". Now, bear with me, these days google seems to use some kind if machine learning to suggest results to you based on what others have searched and chosen. What does this mean, practically? At least two things: 1.Laymen have to think less critically, less technically when searching. Considering google is, for the average person, basically the window to knowledge, I think this is ultimately a disservice to society. 2. Search quality for technical information seems to be declining, now that laymen and non-laymen alike are searching using the same " extra" words and, I may just be projecting a poor understanding of neural nets here, but our technical results end up getting sort of clustered with everything else. Am I the only one who has this problem with the decline of google search's technical relevance? Maybe I'm doing something wrong...I still think what google has done to make the internet more accessible may be a net harm to society.
    - 9y ago

vthriller 9y ago

not to mention that sum() or forall() might mean nothing to people who don't speak English, so for them those would just be another set of things to memorize anyway