There are only a few people who do all the calculations with their minds. Most others get help from a calculator if they have to do some basic math. I think this will become very normal in the future. I remember my parents mentioning that they used to teach 16 tables and 20 tables while studying during their school days. These days we cannot expect the kids to learn that much as it becomes a huge burden for them. When I was studying in school we had to by heart only till 12 tables.
Our grandfathers and grandmothers used to be very good in mathematics for this very reason because they did not have the help from technology to do the calculation and they had to do all the calculations only with their mind. This way they were able to retain their mind power and at the same time reduce their dependency on technology. But today we are too much into technology and we find it hard to do things that can be done with just human efforts.
My grandfather used to tell me that I had grown lazy for not going to a nearby shop for a walk. I look for my motorbike to go to the nearby shop. The main reason is because I would like to make it faster. I don't want to spend more time on walking. But when I had health issues and when the doctor asked me to walk a lot that is when I understood the importance of walking. It was not always about walking increasing our heart rate and helping in blood circulation. The biggest advantage that walking gave us was to get a chance to observe the environment around us and enjoy nature while walking. This gives us peace of mind and thus the importance of taking things slow is also learned. I know I have deviated a lot from the topic but this was an important learning that I recently had in my life.
Technological advancements are good but we cannot be highly dependent on them. I won't ask people to stop using calculators and start doing all the calculations with just their minds. That's not the point here. The point is that we should be using our minds and brains wherever possible to keep it fresh and active. If we don't give ourselves a chance for our brain to think, it might get too dependent on technology and in the coming generations, people might slow down their thinking capabilities and become highly dependent on technologies. We can see this already happening and this calculator example is one such huge dependency that we have created.
I think it would be ideal to teach the kids in the school to not use calculators for their calculations and to be confident about their basic mathematics. Even when we use the calculator at a point, we should have the basic knowledge of how efficiently we can use the calculator, and at the same time, we should also know to validate if the calculations presented in front of us are correct or not.
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