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Teaching Maths in Britain


Johnny Bognor
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1. Teaching Maths In 1970

A timber merchant sells a lorry load of timber for £100..

His cost of production is 4/5 of the price.

What is his profit?

 

2. Teaching Maths In 1980

A timber merchant sells a lorry load of timber for £100.

His cost of production is 80% of the price.

What is his profit?

 

3. Teaching Maths In 1990

A timber merchant sells a lorry load of timber for £100.

His cost of production is £80.

How much was his profit?

 

4. Teaching Maths In 2000

A timber merchant sells a lorry load of timber for £100.

His cost of production is £80 and his profit is £20.

Your assignment: Underline the number 20.

 

5. Teaching Maths In 2005

A timber merchant cuts down a beautiful forest because he is selfish and inconsiderate and cares nothing for the habitat of animals or the preservation of our woodlands.

Your assignment: Discuss how the wildlife might feel as the timber merchant cut down their homes just for a measly profit of £20.

 

6. Teaching Maths In 2009

A timber merchant is arrested for trying to cut down a tree in case it may be offensive to Muslims or other religious groups not consulted in the felling licence. He is also fined a £100 as his chainsaw is in breach of Health and Safety legislation as it deemed too dangerous and could cut something... He has used the chainsaw for over 20 years without incident however he does not have the correct certificate of competence and is therefore considered to be a recidivist and habitual criminal. His DNA is sampled and his details circulated throughout all government agencies. He protests and is taken to court and fined another £100 because he is such an easy target.

 

When he is released he returns to find Gypsies have cut down half his wood to build a camp on his land. He tries to throw them off but is arrested, prosecuted for harassing an ethnic minority, imprisoned and fined a further £100. While he is in jail again the Gypsies cut down the rest of his wood and sell it on the black market for £100 cash. They also have a departure B-B-Q of squirrel and pheasant and leave behind several tonnes of rubbish and asbestos sheeting.

 

The timber merchant / forester on release is warned that failure to clear the fly tipped rubbish immediately at his own cost is an offence. He complains and is arrested for environmental pollution, breach of the peace and invoiced £12,000 plus VAT for safe disposal costs by a regulated government contractor.

 

Your assignment: How many times is the timber merchant going to have to be arrested and fined before he realises that he is never going to make £20 profit by hard work, give up, sign onto the dole and live off the state

for the rest of his life?

 

7. Teaching Maths In 2010

A timber merchant doesn’t sell a lorry load of timber because he can’t get a loan to buy a new lorry because his bank has spent all his and their money on a derivative of securitised debt related to sub- prime mortgages in Alabama and lost the lot with only some government money left to pay a few million pound bonuses to their senior directors and the traders who made the biggest losses.

 

The timber merchant struggles to pay the £1,200 road tax on his old lorry. However, as it was made in the 1970s it no longer meets the emissions regulations and he is forced to scrap it.

 

Some Bulgarian timber merchants buy the lorry from the scrap merchant and put it back on the road. They undercut everyone on price for haulage and send their cash back home, while claiming unemployment for themselves and their relatives. If questioned they speak no English and it is easier to deport them at the governments expense. Following their holiday back home they return to the UK with different names and fresh girls and start again. The timber merchant protests, is accused of being a bigoted racist and as his name is on the side of his old lorry he is forced to pay £1,500 registration fees as a gang master.

 

The Government borrows more money to pay more to the bankers as bonuses are not cheap. The parliamentarians feel they are missing out and claim the difference on expenses and allowances. You do the maths.

 

8. Teaching Maths 2017

أ المسجل تبيع حموله شاحنة من الخشب من اجل 100 دولار. صاحب تكلفة

الانتاج 80 من الثمن. ما هو الربح له؟= 20

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In the UAE and Oman (the only Muslim states that I have visited), all of the road and shop signs are in Arabic and English.

 

Perhaps they have their own version of the joke?

 

Im sure that isn't enough for many on here who prefer the whole world only spoke English and all other alphabets were banned.

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I'd prefer the whole world spoke English simply because I'm sht at languages. Is interesting how different languages develop though. You'd imagine they'd merge into one at some point at communications become more global. Give it 500 years maybe, everyone talking spanarablish and trading world dollars. Which will be more efficient anyway. Bad news for international football but good news for the downfall of nationalist fckwits.

 

This - make me chuckle at the stupidity of nationalists when they dont relaise the current concept of Englishness dates from around 1066, er when we wer French, oh and the Roman influence and Saxons prior to that... all bringing elemenst of tehir langugae which has stuck and evolved... anyone of them care to read ;let alone understand 'Old English' ... LOL... all naturally put into perspective when humans have been around for approx 2 mil years most of that tiem with the only borders being geographic/topical features, on a planet that is 4500 mil years old and it shows just how pathetic (or unevolved ;-)) these nationlist are... As to how soon we all speak the same languge, that depends on how long it takes for the good folks of teh planet to realise there is feck all to be gained from hating each other and more profit and success in trade if folks get along... but dont be surprized if its not Mandarin or hindustani

 

I guess that 'joke' has obvious appeal to Daily Mail readers...so probably why I did not find it funny.

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This - make me chuckle at the stupidity of nationalists when they dont relaise the current concept of Englishness dates from around 1066, er when we wer French, oh and the Roman influence and Saxons prior to that... all bringing elemenst of tehir langugae which has stuck and evolved... anyone of them care to read ;let alone understand 'Old English' ... LOL... all naturally put into perspective when humans have been around for approx 2 mil years most of that tiem with the only borders being geographic/topical features, on a planet that is 4500 mil years old and it shows just how pathetic (or unevolved ;-)) these nationlist are... As to how soon we all speak the same languge, that depends on how long it takes for the good folks of teh planet to realise there is feck all to be gained from hating each other and more profit and success in trade if folks get along... but dont be surprized if its not Mandarin or hindustani

 

I guess that 'joke' has obvious appeal to Daily Mail readers...so probably why I did not find it funny.

 

Well, Frank, your usage of the English language is certainly evolving. In which direction is hard to say though. ;)

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The last entry needs to be in Mandarin, not Arabic. China will be the world superpower by then, and the whole idea of a Western-Muslim quasi religious guerilla war will be a long distant and slightly curious memory. Turns out communism works and capitalism doesn't - who'd have thought it?

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The last entry needs to be in Mandarin, not Arabic. China will be the world superpower by then, and the whole idea of a Western-Muslim quasi religious guerilla war will be a long distant and slightly curious memory. Turns out communism works and capitalism doesn't - who'd have thought it?

 

The success of China's economy has very little to do with Communism, as they have embraced Capitalism in all but name. There are only a few Communist states remaining and I don't see Cuba, Albania and North Korea for example as shining examples of it working.

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I'd prefer the whole world spoke English simply because I'm sht at languages. Is interesting how different languages develop though. You'd imagine they'd merge into one at some point at communications become more global. Give it 500 years maybe, everyone talking spanarablish and trading world dollars. Which will be more efficient anyway. Bad news for international football but good news for the downfall of nationalist fckwits.

 

That would be a logical conclusion, but actually if you look at the UK as an example , although English is of course the dominant language, the Welsh and the Scots have gone to great lengths in recent years to keep their own languages, and indeed the Welsh effectively force many of their children to speak Welsh in school and use it in official situations. Welsh is probably spoken more widely now than it was a generation or two ago.

 

There seems to be a level at which the state or the nation or whatever the group is , becomes too big for many people and they want to sub-divide and keep a separate identity. Look at all the supposedly 'Irish' Americans ...many times as many as there are Irish in Ireland. See also how passionately French Canadians stay 'French'

 

So personally I don't think there will ever be a common language, and even if we approached one there'd be local dialects and accents that made it different in reality. Apparently Geordies speak English for example, but ....

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To be fair, the funniest entry was this one:

 

"4. Teaching Maths In 2000

A timber merchant sells a lorry load of timber for £100.

His cost of production is £80 and his profit is £20.

Your assignment: Underline the number 20."

 

Very good!!

 

Have you noticed the mistake in that?

 

No merchant has made any profit for several years now.

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Is the answer "RAAAAA White working class males getting screwed over by illegals RAAAAA"?

 

Do you not feel sorry for the ''White working class male'' in the tale above, at all? He only wanted to make £20!

 

I liked the bit about him not having a certificate for a tool he has been using for 20 years, I can imagine that happening by some council non-jobber...

 

also the gypsies wasting his land whilst he is in jail, and he has to pay the costs afterwards... definately plausible!

 

The bit about being forced to scrap his van is also poignant yet amusing - it is reasons like this I will not hire or pay foreigners to do work when I suspect they are playing the system, like the Bulgarians in the anecdote... these human car washes, gardeners, fast food vans etc, I suspect they are on UK benefits whilst not declaring a cash in hand income, so I will not support them!

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