[Contribution] Math is a neglected educational relic

Stars that inhabit the night sky in a tapestry of intricate laws of physics governing space and motion are mostly ignored by the majority of people. Many mistakenly believe that the limited space around them represents the whole and struggle through life on the two-dimensional surface of the Earth.

This supreme goal of such a fish-tank existence only goes so far, as the limited visible space amid the unconscious and unseen wonders of the world. Let us take the analogy of the cell phone and the telescope to understand this phenomenon a little better.

While the two instruments share the commonality of widening the scope of our reach, communication and vision, they are fundamentally different as one is a two-dimensional expansion while the other is three-dimensional one.

In the case of mobile telecommunication, its offering of a communication network regardless of location contributes to today`s fast-paced era of production. However, while cell phones have enormously expanded our communication reach across the two-dimensional surface of this world, they also have presented us with negative side effects. The use of cell phones while driving, at inappropriate public places, by students during school, and other such uses all have contributed to the greater chaos in man`s society today.

On the other hand, the telescope, which has become an archaic tool of the past in the minds of the general public, is indeed a wondrous tool that brings man and nature together. It has taken man to places where he couldn`t possibly reach nor see with his senses. It greatly widens the time-space conceptualization of mankind.

We can realize the vastness of our world through the telescope. While the telescope offers such possibilities of better understanding the world and the life on it, many have turned their backs to such opportunity, as they move about satisfied in their confined fish tanks.

To understand the world, the things and the laws in it, we must take a step backward. As we step back and observe the life of the spider as it lives out its life on the web, we can better understand it than it can itself. It would be foolish indeed to study the exterior of the elephant from its stomach. It would be similar to stumbling around within the vast inner chambers of an unfamiliar subway station.

Man is a three-dimensional being. As such, man must shake off his self-imposed two-dimensional ideals and look to the three-dimensional space-time continuum. For such, man needs to be educated in a field of study that analyzes the past and looks into the future.

It is undisputed that math is an important tool, which shapes our minds, especially in today`s information society. However, as it is a theoretical science, it is difficult to understand for some and despised by many students. Worse yet, our society has mistakenly applied the rule of demand and given the freedom of choice to study math, or not, to students.

As a result, during this time when mathematical reasoning has come to the forefront of importance, Korea faces a great disability in the area of mathematical education. It is a result of the ideology that gives much greater weight to the practical and the visible while neglecting the difficult and unseen.

The cell phone offers the world of practical education in English and computers, while the telescope offers mathematical and physical laws of nature. The true understanding of the world must begin with the realization of the importance of the telescope. We should understand the importance of the elementary and theoretical fields of study, as we keep the analogy of the cell phone and the telescope clearly in our minds.