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Yesterday I wrote about the math competition I help judge every year, and the emphasis was on the futility of trying when you don’t know what you’re doing, when you haven’t trained.

This year, the competitors were unusually verbose. Some years, those who have no idea how to solve the problems don’t write many words. This year, there were a plethora of words on papers which received no credit.

Why didn’t they receive credit? Because nothing they said was true or relevant to the problem. And mathematics is one of the few arenas left in the world of education where we don’t have to reward students for trying or for writing a bunch of nonsense.

Mathematics is still concerned with truth. And when we look at papers, they are coded so we don’t know the students’ names. Not their names, not their race or gender or age or grade. We are concerned only with the truth of what’s written there. Students’ sincerely believing that their answers are correct doesn’t make them correct.

Friday I saw some of the most beautifully written solutions, neat, organized, demonstrating, for example, how to get those 10 numbers that I wrote about yesterday equal. Unfortunately, good mathematics proves that they can’t be made equal under the processes we gave them.

There is truth in a world that doesn’t believe in facts or believes in “alternative facts,” or among people who believe that all religions are essentially the same. Either Pilate’s view of the world is true or Jesus’. Either Jesus is the Truth and the Son of God or he’s not.

Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” (John 18.37, 38, ESV)

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? (John 14.6 – 9, ESV)