[BlackFingolfin]

I find it strange to compare "math" with one programming language. Mathematics is a huge and diverse field, with many subcommunities and hence also differing notation.

Your rant would be akin to this if the sides are reversed: "It's surprising how many different ways there are to describe the same thing. Eg: see all the notations for dictionaries (hash tables? associative arrays? maps?) or lists (vectors? arrays?).

You don't have "the manual" of programming languages. "

[segfaultex]

Not the original commenter, but I 100% agree that it's weird we have so many ways to describe dictionaries/hash tables/maps/etc. and lists.

[worthless-trash]

> You don't have "the manual" of programming languages. "

Well, we kinda do when you can say "this python program" the problem with a lot of math is that you can't even tell which manual to look up.

[nkrisc]

Someone not educated in programming would not know that a given text is Python source code.

[worthless-trash]

Same problem, but unlike math notation, it is MUCH clearer and even my 10 year old newphew can tell python from javascript and C.

[nkrisc]

I would wager that a vast majority of people on the planet could not distinguish Python from JavaScript from C.

[worthless-trash]

When it says "this python" program, they dont need to, it says its python. Math notation doesn't have that clarity.