Comments | tartrazine: Insert joke about unladen swallows here

tartrazine

Insert joke about unladen swallows here

Feb 20, 2007 12:00

On Sunday, I ate breakfast at a restaurant that had a vacation contest. As usual, the ballot had a mathematical skill-testing question. Not for the first time, I wondered "WTF? Why is remembering BEDMAS a requirement for winning a trip for two?".

The answer to this Canadian oddity is found in a particularly concise and informative wikipedia ( Read more... )

Comments 3

ext_2245 February 21 2007, 01:10:01 UTC

I believe there was a court case mentioned in a page on this where a guy faced a problem like

2+4*5=?

Answered 22, and was told he got it wrong (the "answer" being 30). I think he won, but apparently a knowledge of BEDMAS is not required.

kaijugal February 21 2007, 07:35:32 UTC

Strangely I knew the reason for "skill testing questions" being neccessary, but not what BEDMAS was.

I think it's sucky that "skill testing" always = Math.

tartrazine February 22 2007, 06:07:50 UTC

I should have just said "order of operations". Wired had an article with more info on the law. Apparently, math questions became the de facto standard in 1984. Before that, judges had rejected challenges such as potato peeling and shooting turkeys as too easy. They really should just get rid of the silly law.