[SoothingDave]

Algebra is about understanding mathematics as a general principle, and not as a matter of which specific numbers add up to what or what. It is an abstraction of thinking, a seeing the forest rather than the trees.

One who can not acheive this on a rudimentary level is going to have a difficult time thinking about numbers in general.

SD

[Flavius Josephus]

I'm with you Dave. I rarely set up algebraic equations to figure something out (sometimes I do), but I don't think I could flip numbers around in my head the way I do if I couldn't do it on an intuitive level. It was worth the pain.

OTOH, logic and reason are tools of the White Oppressor Man.