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too observant mathsisfun
exactly right - the cray supercomputer - thats why I chose the name for this forum
most of the posts here look like everyone got a supercomputer for a brain when they do maths.
ER .. does this make me sound old or what ?????? but I actually used to work on
IBM mainframes as an operator (back so long ago I dont want to remember when) I dont know if you know about these things but you sound like you have a similar background
they were IBM 370/158's and 370/159's
Oh dear I'm old enough to know better than try and join in with some of the geniuses I have seen posting here.
but 0 really isnt a number - the romans never had any concept of a zero in their system
the Greeks managed fine without a zero for quite a while too
infact you will see what I am saying in a second
the number 1378 is merely a kind of shorthand for the sum
1000.000... + 300.000.... + 70.000... + 8.000...
notice all the zero's after the point stretch to infinity
the zero merely denotes the complete abscence of a number at a certain point in the sum
so 1305 = 1000.000.... + 300.000... +5.000...
I rest my case - zero is the abscence of a number - not a number in itself
therefore it is true that numbers range on the real number scale as
3,2,1,-1,-2,-3
and since .999... is neither -1 or +1 then the difference is between 1 and -1
that has to be the case it just cannot be otherwise
I havent got time to continue this right now -
I'll be back tomorrow. -
I'm not a mathematician, however I love doing little mathematical and logic puzzles -
I read the whole of a book called "fermats last theorem" and that really got me into trying harder with numbers.
What caught my attention here is the puzzle
1/3 = .333...
2/3 = .666...
3/3 = .999...
how can that be? 1=1 and 1=.999 !!!
Anyway if I can just find that thread again I would be happy
Ok heres two things may surprise you
1) I dont get why the people who say .999r is not = 1 cant accept that 1=.999r
I dont get why you think that 1/3 is not = .3333
after all
1/3 =.333
2/3 = .666
3/3 = .999
2) go to google and type this exactly into google : .999999999999 + .999999999999
it will give you an answer of 2
google is also a scientific calc and if you type enough 9's it know you mean its a reccuring number.
then type .999999999999 - 1
the answer is 1
I'm not a person that says its right - google say so
the claim is that 1=1 and 1=.999r
but none of you seem able to provide proof for the opposite claim
namely that 1=1 and 1 != .999r
("!" means, "not")
so I fail to see why people cant accept that 1 can = both
its obvious that it can
there is no difference between 1/3 and .333r
so why you think theres a difference between 3/3 and .999r ?
Personally I think some of you believe that the missing number is lost somewhere back in the 9's
an infinite distance back - my own theory is that 0 is not a number and the rel sequence of numbers is therefore
3 2 1 -1 -2 -3
think of those on a east to west axis
but the missing .1 is somewhere in an infinite number on a north south axis between 1 and -1