French people who are bad at math: the cry of alarm from three big bosses

by time news

“The keys to sustainable and inclusive progress”

Christel Heydemann, CEO of Orange

The backbone of science and technology, mathematics is essential. They are of course used to better understand our world, from the laws of physics to biological balances, including chemistry and geology. But that’s not all: mathematics forces us to develop a certain capacity for abstraction, to handle complex concepts, to seek solutions to seemingly purely theoretical problems. In short, mathematics teaches you to think. Far from the elitist image that this discipline may have, it requires – on the contrary – a deep humility. You can’t cheat, make do with approximations and shortcuts with math. And this is not new: Galileo had already identified that “mathematics is a dangerous science: it reveals deceptions and miscalculations”.

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The current period, the multiple crises we are going through, the psychoses and others fake news which we are sometimes the target can only strengthen us in the need to train young people in mathematics. They have enabled the rapid development of new technologies: it seemed unthinkable a few decades ago to know how to convert an electric current into artificial intelligence, to be able to communicate so easily from one end of the planet to the other, or even to produce huge amounts of data. The challenges ahead of us are many. The climate challenge is undoubtedly the most urgent of them, as the number of parameters to be optimized is large, and the equation complex.

And yet, I see that math attracts less young people and even less young women. At Orange, as elsewhere, this generation brings immense hope. They are the ones who will make the society of tomorrow, with their convictions and their expectations. Training the youngest in mathematics gives them the keys to building a better future, and leading humanity towards sustainable and inclusive progress.

“A crucial issue for the intellectual and psychological development of future generations”

Alexandre Ricard, PDG de Pernod Ricard

Like Monsieur Jourdain, we all do math without knowing it, and I must admit that these everyday equations and rules of three are a little personal recreation for me. I therefore regret the impoverishment of the mathematical curriculum which will not be without consequences for the intellectual and psychological development of future generations. Because we know what the practice of this discipline brings to a number of essential cognitive functions, such as reasoning ability, memory or even creativity.

To find their place in the company, young graduates must understand and speak the language of numbers, a universal language, very much alive, essential and often playful.

I refuse to oppose literary and scientific, and the diversity of profiles is a tremendous source of wealth for the company. Nevertheless, in many management activities, a minimum of familiarity with math is required. In an increasingly competitive world, it is vital to evaluate one’s performance. However, in this matter, a table is worth 10,000 words, and a few seconds should suffice, on the basis of quantified and well-arranged values, to understand the situation of an entity, its strengths, its weaknesses, its prospects. Mathematics in all its forms and the intellectual gymnastics that they implement are an integral part of the skills required in business.

As long as our most formidable calculators do not understand the language of Molière, nor that of Shakespeare for that matter, it will take to configure and interpret them minds sensitive to science and technology. The future of many companies now rests on their ability to make the most of the famous data, which is the culmination of an unimaginable amount of data and other algorithms. In the gigantic grammar of figures, this information is an extraordinary accelerator of growth for those who know how to cross them, export them, project them. In short, make them talk.

We are lucky, in France, to have scientific skills and academic backgrounds that the whole world envies us. Let’s not waste our talents. We all need math. In all their forms, they still have so much to teach us.

“A real danger for our democracies”

Patrice Caine, CEO of Thales

Worrying news follows one another about the level of mathematics and science in our country. After the poor results obtained in the international rankings, we learned recently that the number of candidates eligible for the Capes de maths was lower than the number of open positions. While we are going to need engineers and researchers more than ever to face the immense challenges (climate, energy, technology) that stand before us, this trend is cause for concern. Because beyond the issue of training, I see in this worrying development a weakening of scientific culture and a real danger in the long term for our democracies, against which it is urgent to mobilize.

Each new crisis reveals it to us more acutely: social networks have accelerated the shift of our society into the era of generalized doubt. The prevailing horizontality tends to level the sources of information. The word of scholars is often placed on the same level as that of improvised commentators or self-proclaimed scholars, as if all the arguments were valid. As if it were legitimate, in the era of digital democracy, to doubt everything.

There is a serious misunderstanding here. Because if doubt is indeed the keystone of the critical spirit, and, as such, of the scientific approach, it is neither rational nor reasonable to have recourse to it under any conditions. There are indeed indisputable scientific truths. The anthropogenic origin of global warming, the roundness of the earth, the validity of vaccination as a means of fighting against infectious epidemics are indisputable facts. They have been sufficiently modelled, tested by science, confirmed by methodical observations and reinforced over time by their consistency with a body of related knowledge. To question them on the basis of fragile testimonies, often anonymous therefore detached from any responsibility, or on the basis of facts gleaned here or there on the Web, this is not reasonable. And unfortunately, that is nothing out of the ordinary either. Because questioning a scientific consensus can, in fine, resulting in loss of human life. Think of the difficulties encountered when implementing health measures against the Covid-19 pandemic or the major risks that insufficient intervention in the fight against global warming would pose. Doubting the facts often results in delaying action. Unreasonable distrust of science kills.

Faced with this danger, schools must be given the objective and the means of disseminating scientific culture to the widest possible audience, well beyond young people who are destined for careers in engineering or research. More specifically, I think that action must be taken on four complementary dimensions.

First of all, it seems essential to me that each citizen has a base of basic knowledge on the scientific and technological realities that shape his daily life. It is a dangerous posture to resign oneself to being only passive users of tools that are beyond us or to give up understanding our environment. Mastering the mechanisms of the greenhouse effect, knowing what an algorithm is or how a nuclear power plant works, these are some examples of a fundamental corpus whose acquisition should make it possible to protect against the crudest misinformation.

Within the sciences, it is also necessary to restore to mathematics the central place that it has long occupied in the formation of critical thinking. The virtues of this discipline are incomparable for the development of capacities for analysis, synthesis, construction and demonstration of rigorous reasoning.

Thirdly, young people must be taught how, under what conditions, it is appropriate to place one’s trust in a statement claiming to be scientific. The American philosopher Elizabeth Anderson, for example, showed that a fairly simple methodology and easily accessible information were enough to correctly assess its legitimacy: Do those who speak have recognized qualifications in the field in question? Are they attached to credible institutions? Have they published in peer-reviewed journals? Do they have a history of links with interest groups? Here are some examples of questions that easily allow you to flush out those who spread untruths under the guise of pseudo-scientific reasoning. So let’s give all students this essential critical tool to protect themselves from unjustified and deleterious skepticism.

Finally, and this is perhaps the most important, in my opinion, it is necessary to familiarize young people even more than today with the procedures of research and the standards of scientific truth. Let them discover through practice the level of requirement with which the experimental protocols are developed. Let them see the critical importance of peer review. Let’s show them how researchers track down the slightest cognitive biases likely to taint their results. Thus perhaps they will be better able to appreciate the value of a conclusion which has been able to overcome all these trials.

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Faced with the immense challenges that humanity will have to meet in the short term, this commitment to the dissemination to as many people as possible of a fundamental scientific culture seems to me to be an absolute priority. Because our ability to unite behind science is an essential condition for succeeding in building a more harmonious and trusting world.


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