[nuttingd]

> which makes a very simple concept vastly more confusing than it needs to be.

Agreed. The concepts are all very simple. You can throw away all of the domain-specific terminology and reason about accounting theory with nothing but positive and negative numbers.

The utility of the confusing terminology and age old accounting frameworks isn't obvious unless you are a practitioner living "in it". It's not until you face the complexities of real world transactions (an accountant booking closing entries for a F500 company or something) that the strange left/right debit/credit way of thinking is very valuable.

[lisper]

Sorry, I don't buy it. By the time you get to the point where you're doing the accounting for an F500 company you have been thoroughly indoctrinated into the conventional way of doing things. That doesn't mean that the conventional way isn't deeply flawed. It's kind of like the use of British units in the USA rather than metric. You have 350 million people who are thoroughly comfortable with miles and feet and inches and gallons and whatnot, but that doesn't mean that metric isn't objectively superior.