Why do the British call it “maths”?
In: Mathematics
It’s British folks who are strange.
For some reason, they either think you can have a plural word for which no singular exists, or they think “mathematic” – the singular of mathematics – is somehow a meaningful word.
There’s no such thing as a mathematic. Maybe “mathematic” could be an ajective (although “mathematical” would be a more common choice in this regard) but it’s absolutely not a noun.
“Mathematics” is akin to “Physics” or “Aeronautics”. The “s” on the end of these words isn’t intended to convey the plural of something. There’s no such thing as a “mathematic” in the same way that there’s no such thing as a “physic” or an “aeronautic” (although the latter could, again, work as an adjective). It’s the name of a field of study, not something countable.
Given that “Mathematics” is the name of a field of study and *not* the plural of some countable noun, when abbreviating it, it makes more sense to truncate the word to “Math” rather than remove arbitrary letters from the middle. We don’t truncate “Aeronautics” to “Aeros” after all, do we?
America is actually the only place where it is called “math” … in all other parts of the world it is called “maths”
So the question is really: why do **we** call it “math”
I was just wondering this exact thing!
Been watching too many English teen shows and wondered about that. Wasn’t interested enough to actually Goggle, but strangely took the time to post this.
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