This August 8th, challenge yourself with a handwritten math equation that has been causing a massive debate on social media! It looks exactly like a problem you would have easily solved in grade school, but it is tricking a surprising number of older adults today.
The image asks you to solve: 12 – 4 × 0 + 1.
What makes this puzzle so tricky is our natural instinct to read and calculate straight from left to right. If you do that, you might subtract 4 from 12 to get 8, then multiply by 0 to get 0, and add the final 1 to end up with a completely incorrect 1! That × 0 in the middle of the problem is a classic trap.
To get the right answer, you have to remember the golden rule of math: the order of operations. This rule states that multiplication and division must always be completed before addition and subtraction.
So, your very first step is to tackle the multiplication section. 4 × 0 simply gives you 0.
When you drop that zero back into the problem, the equation becomes incredibly easy: 12 – 0 + 1.
Now you can just subtract and add the numbers together from left to right. 12 minus 0 is still 12, and adding the final 1 brings you directly to your solution.
Answer: 13.
