One time, a teacher said, "How are you going to get through life if you can't do math?" and I said, "With a calculator, Ma'am?"?

That was not a smart thing to do. You may not find math useful but you will definitely find diplomacy useful.

I agree with you about the role of math in the lives of most 21st century citizens of industrial societies. I was in high school in the late 1960s, when it seemed very likely everybody would need all sorts of technical skills. I had that covered, acing my math ACT test and scoring second in the school in the MAA competition. I was fascinated by electronics and it led me on a 46 year (so far) career of high tech. In all that time I have used math above the basics of algebra exactly once.

About 20 years ago I was reflecting on that, triggered by an article in the newspaper about new testing standards. I asked the half dozen or so engineers who were having lunch with me "How many times have you used math above the fundamentals of algebra in your job?" They looked at each other and none of them had ever used advanced math at work. They were application engineers so I asked our microwave path engineer the same question. I know path analysis depends on all sorts of math, such as using Bessel functions to determine fresnel zones. Dave was able to answer that immediately: he used to do a huge amount of that by hand, but for the last five years or so he was using a computer program that did it much faster and more reliably than he could do it.

That is what we didn't really understand in the 1960s: the central function of technology is to increase the abilities of the average person. It takes a Nobel physicist to conceive of a solid state laser; it takes a talented engineer to actually design one, it takes semi-skilled technicians to make them and to mount them in DVD players, and a two year old can use the DVD player. That is the purpose of technology.

Some people must know a lot of math. For every field of math there must be at least a few experts. However, a lot of people have a command of math that doesn't extend beyond grade school and they do just fine. My wife is constantly asking me "Is 2/3 cup and 2/3 cup 1 1/3 cup?" I reply yes. I am constantly asking her, "Does this shirt go with these pants?" She replies, "No, of course not." We both get along beautifully.

Work on that diplomacy, though.

If you don't know fourth grade math, a calculator is not going to help you. And I've seen a few people fired from minimum-wage jobs for not knowing fourth grade math and therefore not being able to tell whether the numbers a computing machine spat out made any sense.

So yes, aside from being disrespectful, it was the sort of thing you'd expect a reasonably intelligent fourth grader to know better than to say. You seem to think it was a clever comeback, and presumably you're at least in fifth grade now, so that's worrisome.

She should not have been using the R word, period, and she wasn't wise to use the S word, but it's at least as fair as you using the A word.

Well, you're wrong. A calculator can't get you through life in case you are somewhere where you don't have any, and calculators can only calculate, not determine how to USE math.

If you choose best answer, leave comments!

You'd need to understand the math to put it into your calculator.

But the idea that professionals don't use a calculator or memorize ALL the formulas by heart is stupid af.

Her point was that knowing math helps you to be logical, which helps you in other areas of life.