I owe much of my understanding of the difference between synthetic and analytic thinking in mathematics to my reading of Michael Otte's papers and the conversations we had with him within the BACOMET group. One of the first sources of inspiration for me has been his work on arithmetic and geometric thinking. In the paper I shall outline the consequences of the distinction for analyzing processes of mathematics teaching and learning in my own research. 1 shall further use this distinction to look critically upon the recent trend in mathematics education of considering mathematics as a kind of "discursive practice."