I understand your viewpoint. Im actually not the biggest fan of algebra. I prefer problems like geomatry or statistics gives you.
Remember, all code is made by someone, including the language you code in...So every programming language has the capability to be messy. Allowances they call it, making code very simple and understandable, so others can use it. Primarily because thats what the internet was meant to be for. I do actually try to understand your code, and sometimes I've asked about the mult and such, but I prefered to not to much ask what every bit meant, and try to work it out. I ended up working out the rough gist, and over time I get a greater understanding of the chunks of the code as it gets tweaked and adjusted. Versions of code I work best to learn from. ABS was just a bit I didn't crack.