Math wars and the epistemic divide in mathematics

especially difficult?1 (b) What is a good way to amel-iorate these difficulties? (c) Would the new technol-ogy of computation fundamentally change the content of mathematics? 2. Earlier attempts The “new ” math curriculum of the 1960’s and 1970’s sought to align mathematics teaching with the formalist approach to mathematics, finalized in the 1930’s. More recently, the reformed constructivist “new new math” curriculum, endorsed by the US Education Department in 1999, but rejected as “fuzzy math ” and “no correct-answer math ” by its opponents,2 has sparked off a huge dispute called the “Math War”. 3. Our analysis Learning difficulties peculiar to mathematics are th