[aleph_minus_one]

> A few days ago someone asked why math classes don’t the how and why and rather tend to just present the formulas for the operations and tell people to compute.

The lecturer typically do know quite well the how and why, but teaching these points takes a lot of time (you also have to explain a lot about the practical application until you are able to explain why this mathematical structure is helpful for the problem).

Since lecturers are typically very short of time in lectures, they teach the mathematics in a concise way and trust the students to be adults, capable of going to the library, and reading textbooks about the how and why by themselves if they are interested in this. At least in Germany, there is the clear mentality that if you are not capable of doing this, a university is a wrong place for you; you should better get vocational training instead.