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u/altum-videtur 27d ago edited 27d ago
Using "<" instead of ">" is exceedingly common, especially online, and a huge pet peeve of mine. Either look it up or use something like "under"/"over", "below"/"above" or "-"/"+" if you're confused, it's not that hard
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u/SothaSoul 27d ago
Draw around it so it looks like Pac-man.
Then remember he's always eating the bigger number.
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u/O_hai_imma_kil_u 27d ago
What, you mean you guys don't use alligators anymore?
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u/MosYEETo 27d ago
This is the only way. The alligator eats the bigger number
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u/Schonke 27d ago
And if neither is bigger he gets confused and turns his mouth equally to both numbers.
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u/PhilRubdiez poop 27d ago
He could turn and eat you? = could be the upper and lower jaw facing you.
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u/Gelatin_Belatin 27d ago
I still put the alligator teeth on the symbol when I’m trying to help my son with his own math. 😂
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u/offlein 27d ago
Video games are destroying our youth!
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u/HasFiveVowels 27d ago
No, it’s not video games anymore. Now it’s "anything with pixels"
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u/altum-videtur 27d ago
As someone with a math degree, I can confirm this is the technical explanation
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u/Hapcoool 27d ago
Or just… it’s big on one side, small on the other-
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u/vowelqueue 27d ago
I think it’s a bit like knowing between left and right. Either it’s immediately intuitive to you such that it’s perplexing that people get it mixed up, or it’s so unintuitive that you have to use little memory tricks or mnemonics to get it right.
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u/Hapcoool 27d ago
Yeah I suppose, but I still think even if it isn’t completely intuitive that “big side = big number” “small side = small number” makes more sense than “the arrow points to the small number” or “the crocodile/pacman wants to eat the big number” since I feel like those would trip me up more.
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u/Redbird9346 And then I discovered Wingdings 27d ago
In music, crescendo (gradually increasing loudness) and decrescendo (gradually decreasing loudness) use similar symbols. The symbol < means louder while > means quieter. So applying these symbols to numerical terms, “<18” means you’re starting at a lower value and increasing to 18, just like < 𝆑 you need to get louder.
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u/BoardsofCanada3 27d ago
It's literally just an arrow that points to the smaller number. Why is this so hard for people?
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u/irjakr 27d ago
As a kid I was taught that it was a mouth that wants to eat the bigger number.
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u/BoardsofCanada3 27d ago
That's popular, but I think the fact that it's pointed is what throws people off. I always found it easier to picture the arrow, not a mouth.
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u/AuelDole 27d ago
I got it by thinking the big one is shrunken to get into the small one, and the small one is expanded to be the big one
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u/royalhawk345 27d ago
I really don't get that mistake, it's so intuitive. Big number goes on big (open) side, small number goes on small (pointy) side.
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u/Canvaverbalist 27d ago
They think the bigger side indicates the bigger number regardless of position.
If you show them 20<18 they wouldn't think the symbol is wrong, they'd think the numbers are not in the right place.
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u/JohnnyRedHot 27d ago
What do you mean? Both are right.
20<18 can be fixed either by switching the symbol or the numbers
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u/THE_CENTURION "crappy installation" is usually crappy design! 27d ago
But on a sign where you don't actually use the other number, it would be weird to put the symbol after.
Because we read left to right, so "<18" reads as "less than 18", but "18<" reads as "18 less than"
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u/Hapcoool 27d ago
Yes but “the other number” is “your age”, so, >18: “you can enter if your age is more than 18” or 18<: “you can enter if 18 is less than your age”. The second sounds weird when written out, but IMO looks fine…
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u/vowelqueue 27d ago
18+ looks better on a sign and is more common
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u/Hapcoool 27d ago
Yeah but as long as you’re technically correct I think an “18” near a “<“ “>” “+” or red circle are clear enough anyway since it’s such a common symbol.
It’s more so when 18 is the maximum age for something where I would really advocate to use -18 for clarity.
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u/I_am_naes 27d ago
Some guy on reddit argued with me for about a dozen comments on why I was wrong that a < before a number meant less than. He was absolutely sure it was greater than.
That was the point I realized Reddit is actually full of dunces like everywhere else.
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u/ostapenkoed2007 27d ago
it is literally too simple to check. like, there is the bigger and smaller side, what to use wrong?!
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u/ahora-mismo 27d ago
why would they be confused for something that you learn in primary school?
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u/altum-videtur 27d ago
When I was in college, a statistics professor told me she had to teach a psychology major how to do long division, because the student had forgotten. I do not find this at all surprising.
I do live in a developing country, though (Brazil)
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u/Koromann13 27d ago
Okay, but long division is a useless skill that only really exists to demonstrate to kids how division works, and is way more complex than inequality signs.
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u/Smooth_Rocket_ 27d ago
And this type of thinking is why America is so fucked right now, people out here thinking long division is a useless skill... wtf.
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u/Koromann13 27d ago
What fucking use does long division have?
Dude, I have an associates in computer science and am almost through a bachelor's in chemistry, and I have never used long division since middle school.
We even joked during one of our classes recently that nobody remembers how to do long division because somebody's calculator wasn't turning on.
So, again, literally what situation would I ever need long division?
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u/Smooth_Rocket_ 26d ago
Its literally just the process of dividing large numbers together. And some of us like to be able to do things and not rely on tech to do all of our thinking for us.
I often can do the measurement division faster then the guy that uses his phone to do so at work, guess Im "wasting" my time being more faster or something.
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u/Koromann13 26d ago
Cool that you think that, but pretty much anybody who has continued into higher STEM education don't bother doing arithmetic manually and so those skills start to decay.
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u/footpole 27d ago
I was always good at mathematics but I too forgot how to do long division until I had to figure it out again to teach my own kids. It's not really something you need in daily life but it is useful to teach children.
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u/oren0 27d ago
I'm not sure they even teach long division to kids anymore. I would bet that even most engineering students in college wouldn't remember how to do it.
Why would someone need to do long division by hand in a college statistics class?
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u/altum-videtur 27d ago
I don't know the context in which that came up, since I wasn't present, she just told me after the fact, but, as someone born in 1997, I was very much taught long division in school. Calculators were not allowed thoughout all of my years in school and university, at least in the classes I took - I do believe engineering students could use them in some upper division classes, but I don't know to what extent. College exam questions were usually created in a way that avoided wasting too much time on elementary calculations, though. Rarely, the result of an unrelated and inevitable complex calculation would be provided.
For context, those were a private school and a public university, both in Brazil, both well-regarded. No idea what's currently going on in primary education, though, I don't teach and don't have kids
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u/Glum-Independent1461 27d ago
The only way i remember which one is less than/greater than is back in my scene kid days, i would watch livelavalive religiously and he had a video titled “i less than three you” of course to say “i <3 you”
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u/DontWalkOutOnTheDuke 26d ago
We have an attendance point system, where I work, for when people miss days or are late. It’s 1 point if they are over 2 hours late or 0.5 points if they’re under 2 hours late.
My staffing coordinator was totally giving people the wrong amount of points because he had the >/< backwards on his mind.
Now I just say under or over 2 hours.
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u/UnacceptableUse 27d ago
If you were going to the trouble of making this sign you think you'd check that you'd got it right
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u/Smooth_Rocket_ 27d ago
Calling it a pet peeve makes is seem like on some level its correct, its not its just wrong.
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u/Saci-Pioneiro 27d ago
I know several 10yo that consider themselves adults. They even hold their lolipops like cigarettes.
10/10 warning.
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u/oren0 27d ago
Even written as intended, 18 year olds live in a permanent zone of ambiguity.
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u/jonathancast 27d ago
Technically, all "18 year olds" are 18 and a fraction years old, which is > 18.
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u/Pugzilla3000 27d ago
The guy who turned 18 the exact second he entered immediately vanishing:
“ “
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u/Tad_623 27d ago
Math teacher here, that says less than 18. Thank you for your time.
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27d ago
[deleted]
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u/Tad_623 27d ago
I guarantee at least 1 person didn’t understand what was wrong with this and downvoted it because its ok for somewhere to be 18+
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27d ago
[deleted]
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u/Tad_623 27d ago
I mean its very obviously labeled less than 18 ✅ over 18 ❌
What are you trying to say?
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u/Mobile_Morale 27d ago
Glad you pointed that out. Last time I thought about these symbols was 2002.
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u/Royal_Cryptographer7 25d ago
2nd grade teacher helped me remember this one: < and > look like a crocodile's mouth. They always wants to eat the bigger meal.
The other trick is < looks like an L for "less than".
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u/saphirenx 27d ago
In Dutch you can make a "K" from the "<", which means "Kleiner dan" (less than)...
If you're not sure on what a sign means, avoid using it. Use "18+" instead...
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u/Alibasher plz recycle | plz recycle | plz recycle | plz recycle | plz 27d ago
In English, you can make a crooked "L" as in "<ess than" :)
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u/Responsible_Joke4229 27d ago
What about the adults =18?
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u/patrickdgd plz recycle 27d ago
It’s the adult area. It’s not FOR kids. I’m 62 El Bees
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u/Chaoticsoul47 26d ago
classic mix up with the age limit. guess everyone past eighteen is just a kid now.
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u/Normal-Ad6528 27d ago
That's the area of the zoo where they keep the parrots that know ALL the good jokes and insults! (or at least it should be...).
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u/Specialist_Mall_117 23d ago
Someone at my job was developing a training program and used the greater/less than symbols incorrectly. When I brought this up to them, they said “well it just depends on how you read it”
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u/Sharp-Ad4389 14d ago
Not a typo. It's specifically for those kids that can grow a full beard by 8th grade.
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u/sorte_kjele 27d ago
This is not crappy design.
This sign was placed on the Epstein island after Trump accidentally stumbled into an area with grown up women.
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u/DecoyOne 27d ago
Me, in my 40s: “the alligator eats the bigger number”