The internet has yet again delivered with a confusing maths question, and it’s baffling the fuck out of pretty much everyone.
Just like every other maths problem that does the rounds on social media, this one looks pretty simple. But spoiler alert: it’s not.
Earlier this month, Latest News India posed the following challenge on its LinkedIn page, Indy100 reports.
It’s since been shared thousands of times:
Here’s the equation: 60 + 60 x 0 + 1 = ?
To make life easier, there are three answers to choose from: A) 1; B) 61; and C) 122.
Now, if my primary school maths class taught me anything, the answer is clearly A, because anything multiplied by zero is zero. Add one on top of that, and naturally, the answer is one.
But apparently that’s not what everyone thinks:
So how are people getting different answers?
Well, if you use the ‘anything multiplied by zero is zero’ method, you’ll get option A as you’re answer. But people are pointing out the problem with this method is that it does not follow the order of operations, or BODMAS (Brackets, Open, Division, Multiplication, Addition, Subtraction), as you may have learned in school.
So, if you do use BODMAS, you’d multiply first: 60 x 0 = 0. And then you’d add: 0 + 60 + 1 = 61.
Depending on how you put the equation it into a calculator though, you can get either 61 or one as your answer.
Moral of the story? Maths is a fucking confusing subject.
