No mathematician today would flatly refuse to accept the results of an enormous computation as an adequate demonstrat...

christinea303 June 20, 2020

Diagramming

Hi Im having a lot of trouble with diagramming. How did you know to diagram it MT (mathematicians today) and MT- (not mathematicians today). Are these not two separate variables - today versus 1976? What are the rules for something like this, especially when it comes to time and numbers? I oftentimes create a new variable when I shouldn't. It seems counter intuitive for me to create one variable, a negative and a positive, out of something that can be multivariable, and in some cases, infinite. Thanks.

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BenMingov June 21, 2020

Hi Christinea303, thanks for reaching out!

I think one way to think about this is that when two terms are clearly able to labeled as the same term, but one is the positive form of it, and the other is the negative form of it. As far as diagramming goes, it would be useful to equate them in this way to allow us to use the transitive property.

You should definitely not equate terms arbitrarily, however, you should look for opportunities to create longer chains that lead to new deductions. From the first statement, we clearly knew that mathematicians today was a term to be diagrammed. Mathematicians from 1976 may seem like its own term, and we can mentally note it as its own, but it is also clearly the negated form of mathematicians today. Whether or not a single person could be a mathematician with a career spanning pre 1976-now is irrelevant because we are discussing their specific state in 1976 vs now.

I hope this helps. Please let me know if you have any other questions.