My Creed

[Hakudamashi]

A very long time ago, a well respected friend of mine asked me a question. This question is possibly the cornerstone of my current way of thinking and how I grew up to be who am I am today. The question is as follows:
"You are a math teacher to a class of 24 students. You give them a single question to answer, "What is the square root of 9?". 23 of the students answered "3", only one student answered "+/-3". How do you grade the class?"

[The Forgotten Alex]

Give them all F's because I dont care.

[Hakudamashi]

Give them all F's because I dont care.

[Elija2]

The correct student gets full marks. The rest of the class gets half marks.

[jkid101094]

I don't even understand the question.

[Hakudamashi]

I don't even understand the question.

Surely you jest.

[jkid101094]

Surely you jest.

I wish I was kidding because I feel really stupid.

[Hakudamashi]

3x3=9
-3x-3=9

Therefore the square root of 9 can be either positive 3, or negative 3. The same goes for all square roots.
+/-3 is the same as saying positive or negative 3. Saying just "3" is the square root of 9 is only half right.

[jkid101094]

Well I'm not math wizard but I got that part...even though it's still dumb.

What confused me is this;

This question is possibly the cornerstone of my current way of thinking and how I grew up to be who am I am today.

Elaborate.

[Hakudamashi]

I was gonna make a long post elaborating my full thought process of the question, but I think I'll just give the end result.

Essentially, the question got me to think more about individuality and to not follow crowds. The majority can be wrong, so choose what you believe in and stick with it.
Some people may have seemingly convincing evidence, and it's ok to adopt another person's way of thinking, but one must never forget his/her values.

[jkid101094]

I didn't get that from that question at all.

[Hakudamashi]

That just means we think different.

I could post my train of thought, but I dun feel like it.