Hacker News Reader

You haven't understood. I'm actually better at multiplying than the average and was ahead of the class. It doesn't matter that I'm doing two addition operations per single digit multiplication, because its very easy to be more than twice as fast at doubling / halving numbers if the only thing you ever care about is doubling and halving numbers. The pain of memorizing the table is wholly unnecessary. Memorizing is for suckers.

View on HN

> I'm actually better at multiplying than the average and was ahead of the class

I bet that most people on this forum were better than average in elementary school, regardless of the method they were using. I also bet that you would have been even better after memorizing. Recalling from memory is almost instantaneous, it is always faster than having some multiple step algorithm.

What did you eat for breakfast yesterday?

Was recalling that from memory "almost instantaneous"?

Recalling yesterday's breakfast is not the same as multiplication table or some other facts you've memorized. Most people don't memorize their breakfast!

edit: as an example, when someone asks "what's your name", do you not recall much faster than what you ate?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com