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Yes right. > The 48-year-old, who can neither read nor write, would need to call his son to confirm that the payment had been received. Looks like the author
by achow 4y ago
Yes right.
> The 48-year-old, who can neither read nor write, would need to call his son to confirm that the payment had been received.
Looks like the author made up a narrative. These vendors definitely can read numbers, they manage loads of cash through the day. They do lightening fast calculation in their head - which would put a Math grad student to shame.
They may not be able to read, write English (or other languages) but they are very comfortable with numbers and operations on them (addition, subtractions...).
And they would not need "their son" to confirm the amount (they can read), and also they would recognize a very large green checkmark (an icon to confirm successful transaction), so don't need "their son" for that too.
- alsodumb 4y agoI wouldn't be so sure about the author making up the narrative, it very well could be real but it is definitely not the majority. I get what you are saying, but none of this would put "a Math grad student to shame". If you really think it does, you definitely have no clue what grad students do - sincerely, a grad student whose best friend is a math grad student.
- asdted 4y agoI saw college students (not indian) fail to answer basic arithmetic questions like 50-13 stuff like that. He meant they do basic calculations very fast with out a calculator.
- GuB-42 4y agoI am pretty sure many math grad students are not that great at mental arithmetic, which is the topic here. We are obviously not talking about the kind of advanced maths grad students to. It is an interesting topic. I remember seeing an article about teaching maths to shopkeepers kids in third world countries. By western standards, they are quasi-illiterate. They are however remarkably good at tasks like giving change. When asked about their reasoning, it involves exchanging bills and goods rather than abstract numbers, and IIRC, they do better than western schoolkids of the same age.