COVID Calculus, Pandemic Parabolas  

       Countless individuals, youngsters as well as oldsters, have complained to me that they detest or otherwise "suck at math". Many times this is due to the way in which this core subject is taught -- detached from other branches of  logic and knowledge, and at other due to the mild trauma they experienced when trying to memorize times tables in early elementary at warp speed (boring!), only to be told a few years later "take your time, be accurate" -- talk about mixed messages, it's almost enough to make one dislike the subject. This expressed frustration has risen exponentially with the significant increase in remote/virtual teaching formats the past several months (math teachers themselves have also expressed more frustration than other teachers). However, another psychological factor is the lack of awareness of how routinely these same individuals are utilizing math in their daily lives, sometimes approximating a human calculator. What I aspire to do right here, right now, is to raise your awareness (especially you 'haters') as to just how strongly math is woven into your daily lives, whether you know it or not. This, by highlighting  few branches of math (which includes Algebra, Calculus, Geometry, Stats and Probability, and Trigonometry), and examples of the practical daily applications throughout our COVID circumstances in particular. 

Hedging Your Bets: While you haven't been able to go into casinos as much (where people think they can 'break the house' and are enjoying the "ping" of the slots machines while losing a few bucks here and there, while hardly noticing), you have been acting like professional sports bettors whenever you have gone to the store on certain days, as you have witnessed (or indulged in): "an attempt to reduce one's loss on a bet by counterbalancing the loss in some way". Researchers have found that hoarding (e.g., TP) due to an impending or ongoing ('second surge') crisis is dominated in part by people's desire to reduce an initial loss or risk--it's less risky to hoard TP, for instance, and be wrong abut the extent or duration of the crisis, since most of it can be used anyway (or sold Online). Just think about applications to 'black Friday' as you are attracted to sales where you can't return the 'once and done' item, but can always keep it for another occasion...Math in action.

Calculating Risks: Which you do everyday, all day long, as you "calculate or forecast a chance of failure, the probability of which is estimated before the action is taken". Related to 'hedging' and highly dependent on 'risk tolerance' (as well as the perceived chances that such an action might be mitigated or otherwise forgiven, such as when the youngster contemplates sneaking another cookie from the cookie jar or you...). Different applications for business (such as venture capitalists, like those on "Shark Tank" and entrepreneurs who aware of the low chance of initial success for small business but venture anyways, knowing that all successful business owners were no stranger to initial failure), safety (lowering risk by wearing face masks, etc., even if it only lowers the risk a little, given the small cost, versus a safety engineer trying to convince the corporation to invest a large amount in various safety measures), and investing (when your financial advisor, when discussing where you are going to put the last of your 2020 dollars, asks you how much you can tolerate losing and whether you are more of a short/long term investor). Math in action.

Playing the Odds: As in "the ratio of something occurring or not occurring", such as when polling groups made predictions before, during, and even now after the election ("the chances of ____ winning without the battleground states is...."). One I enjoy frequently is when I offer 'double or nothing' to people who are buying 'big ball' lottery tickets, who have always refused the bet; they really do know the odds but are willing to give up the 10$ in the small chance that they might win, and otherwise enjoy the suspense in the meantime (same thing at a little lower level for you daily 'scratch off' players). Math in action.

Law of Averages: in lay terms, the belief that outcomes from a random sample will 'even out' within a small sample size. Sometimes referred to as 'wishful thinking' -- "my luck's just gotta change...it's bound to be better next year..." Mathematical illusions (?)

Pandemic Parabola: As COVID infected more people, the linear depiction on the graph climbed, with the task force presenting a 'worse case scenario' where it rose exponentially, versus where the rate of illness responded to various mitigation measures, and the curve was gradually 'flattened', approaching a horizontal asymptote. Math illustrated.

Squaring the Circle: a problem taunting ancient Greek mathematicians ('geometers' in particular), and now used metaphorically when one is attempting to solve a seemingly impossible situation..."you want a vaccine in how many months?!" Math taunting us.

       Have I convinced you yet, that you are a walking, talking calculator--whether you are predicting how many steps it will take to walk off that Thanksgiving feast (sans a smart watch), arriving before dawn at that 'black Friday' sale just in case the add reassuring you there would be plenty was in error, or taking an extra mask/sanitizer in case others in line were more risk tolerant? If you are going to continue to do so, you may as well get good at it, and try to benefit from any formal instruction. So, enjoy learning and...MAKE GOOD CHOICES!! MATH