Do you make calculations?

Post Reply New Topic

What goes into your calculation?

Do you have to calculate before making decisions?

Please tell me more about this process?

I try to make balanced decisions by weighing up every single factor I can possibly think of.

It's actually quite exhausting, and in obsessing over details I sometimes miss more important, "bigger picture" stuff. Or it all gets so complicated I can't decide.

Also because it's so laborious I will sometimes get fed up of calculating, rebel against it, and just make spur of the moment choices instead. Sometimes good, sometimes bad.

I've spent a lot of my life being unhappy and I think I tend to view every choice as a pivotal opportunity for future happiness (or not). When actually sometimes I'd be happier by just not agonising over every little decision.

No, but you gave me an idea....

Like idk if I visualized a calculator, but instead of putting numbers I put like what I will do. like x+d=?, idk that could be an interesting way to think about some things of course real life will not always work out the way an equation says, but idk if say this and that has worked before maybe I could say this is x, and that is d and when I put those together they equal a result that I want.

Thing is I don't really have a process, seems a lot to me all the stuff going on in my head is just swimming around in there so maybe if I had a process I could clear up the noise a bit. So unfortunately I cannot give you advice on how to help that process. That said now you have got me thinking about that calculator idea....Idk I never tried thinking about things quite that way but I can see some value in it.

I am constantly but intuitively calculating risks and identifying patterns. I don't want to notice that there are three white cars in the right lane, three black cars in the left lane and two red cars in the middle lane - what are the odds? I don't want to see the field of risk in front of me at a community carnival, or be calculating (sifting through factors and possibilities for) the safest route from where I am to my child's classroom door that is 100 feet away. That said, it sure is handy when there is a crisis (I can act quickly and wisely), but those are very infrequent and I am left the other 30,000 days of my life with these endless calculations.

Yes I make calculations daily at work. Linear algebra, differential equations and good old calculus methods get used in solving problems. My personal favorite mathematic technique to use is matrices. They can be translated into dimensional operators for symmetry conversions (for crystal field theory). I can usually do them in my head without needing to write them down step by step.

If you are talking about weighing positives vs. negatives on decisions, I do that quite often in my thought process. Sometimes the correct decision is not the one that is easily weighted toward one side or the other.

Very calculated .. specially , and weighing up all angles and options before being hasty in action or decision making .

I used to play a game , where I would bounce my eyes between the distance of the cars on the motorway .. as a kid . Spacial distancing I guess .

I always calculate where people are in relation to my location. I guage all angles and approaching objects .

Even to the extent of an appearing horizon .. frame by frame even

For everything but money. For money I prefer to wing it.

1: All the relevant and significant numbers I can find.
2: No, but I prefer to.
3: Electronic calculators have taken all the drudgery out of math, and made it fun. You have to perceive a pattern in the problem that changes as the input numbers change, and then try a few variations.

One way to practice is in playing solitaire. In general, you should make every legal move, but sometimes, your chances increase if you ignore one, such as putting a two from the working pile on to a three atop a stack.

i make money calculations all the time

I make calculations of every person that I see. It's my way of navigating the world.

I have poor math skills, but whenever I meet new people, I try to think what to do or say
without leaving a "bad impression."

Before I started paying for everything the sanitary way, I would calculate the tax on a purchase in my head, and try to get only bills for change.
When moving, I make scale drawings of the space and my furniture, and arrange the furniture cutouts to see what works best.
When travelling, I calculate speed, distance, ETA, and fuel stops.
When cooking, I change recipe sizes with math.
To build a solar system, I add up some numbers, and compare several others to keep things compatible.
To win big prizes, I make calculations that others are too lazy to do.
When shopping, I compare prices adjusted for weight, etc, and relate that to the budget, to avoid bad surprises.
When building, I use a bit of algebra to buy the least material that will hold the weight, carry the water, or whatever, and make things that fit in given spaces.
I will occasionally calculate the odds on a game of chance, and play if they are in my favour through someone else getting their sums wrong.
I recently calculated how much freezing wax it would take to equal the heat given off by a standard room heater.
For fun, I'll calculate the volume of oil in an oval tank from a dipstick measurement, even if the level is into the curves.
I calculate how much I'd lose if I used "easy credit" and enjoy my savings.

As a child I did accounting stuff pretty studiously, mostly regarding either social or monetary debt. Social debt is stuff like, if someone does you a favor then you owe them a favor of relatively equal value in return, or if someone hurts you then you owe them a relatively equal amount of pain or loss, though pain and loss are two different 'currencies' with a complicated exchange rate.

My system only got more advanced as I grew up. Some currencies can exchange simply, others very complicatedly, some not at all.

I also learned that the concepts of value and meaning where among the deepest and most complex subjects I ever dove into.

For the uninitiated: No, putting a value to everything doesn't turn you into an unemotional monster. If you do it properly, it becomes a very useful tool for making ethically sound decisions and preventing mistakes that would otherwise hurt people in situations that could have been avoided.

It also helps you to understand the tough decisions that people in leadership positions sometimes have to make. For example, as a leader you have been given the resources to help either 5 people from dying, or help 100 people from grievous and potentially permanent injury. Who do you chose to help? How do you ethically and emotionally parse the results of your action? Is it more important that you take adequate punishment for inevitable loss either decision will make, or is it more important to limit that to a level that doesn't impair your ability to continue leading in the future so that your loss of leadership capability doesn't cause further loss to the people?

The potential complications of it all are immense. It can be cripplingly so. I don't 'account' for everything. I try to manage it in a healthy way but it's inevitable that the balance teeters to the sides of 'careless' or 'crippling' as a matter of course. And of course the less obvious decisions are often met with opposition from people who don't understand.

All in all, it's often just a huge source of stress. Sometimes it pays out, and sometimes people learn to accept your abilities in this regard. I'm just tired. I don't have a level of power that would give my decisions more ease to put into action so I've learned to just let go and let people make mistakes and screw up my life so long is it doesn't cross my ever-constantly lowering bottom line.

The pain and loss sums are quite impossible for humans to calculate, but people who demonstrate great wisdom tend to think that what appears to us as good and bad luck is the invisible hand settling our accounts. So, if we do no harm, we do better overall. Doing no harm can include preventing the continuance of crimes, though.

I like too..they can be handy sometimes

I loved bank forms...