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Re:Rare Greek Variables by jbj on Sunday November 28, 2021 @05:46AM (#29367879)
I had a fantastic math professor in my bachelor of engineering program. Besides promising to do handstand in the last lecture if everybody submitted the teacher evaluation, he would tell math related anecdotes. One about a high school friend, whom just loved the concept of greek letters so much that he invented his own greek letters, upper and lower case. During his hand ins he would regularly define variables as his own invented letters, paw, py or ypricon, and alledgedly did so at his oral exam, causing the censor to be highly confused and embarrased to not be familiar with those characters.

For sure a think-out-of-the-box move, and a good prank for a math teacher

Re:Rare Greek Variables by mbg721 on Sunday November 28, 2021 @08:41AM (#29368819)
I had to re-read that to see that the objection was at an oral exam. I would think most math profs wouldn't even blink at a squiggle as long as it was used consistently.
Re:Rare Greek Variables by OJFord on Sunday November 28, 2021 @09:01AM (#29368949)
For some reason I could just never get zeta right, especially not quickly; so in relevant exams (EE) I wrote 'By <whatever-squiggle>, I mean zeta throughout'. I suppose I don't know for sure that that worked, (spoiler alert: didn't ace them!) but I assume it was ok.
Re:Rare Greek Variables by rrobukef on Sunday November 28, 2021 @10:57AM (#29369875)
One of my math teachers regularly abstracted formulas as houses and cigars. You know, 'cause (3x+5)² kind of looks like a house with an x as front door and a ² as a chimney. Cigars were used instead of ellipsoids. When translated they flew through space.
Re:Rare Greek Variables by bee_rider on Sunday November 28, 2021 @01:16PM (#29371295)
Extremely tangential, but when I was learning algebra I for some reason always envisioned it as a great battle between the forces on either side of the equals sign. Terms being added and subtracted were normal troops. Multiplication -- great leaders and generals. Division -- special forces who could lay waste to the other side.

The analogy is really not illuminating in any way whatsoever, but it did add a fun narrative to my problem sets.

Re:Rare Greek Variables by layer8 on Sunday November 28, 2021 @09:01AM (#29368947)
That reminds me that I used xmas trees and reindeers as index marks (i.e. instead of prime and double prime) in a hand-in once, obviously around xmas time.