• SpeakerToLampposts@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          I recall an anecdote about a mathematician being asked to clarify precisely what he meant by “a close approximation to three”. After thinking for a moment, he replied “any real number other than three”.

        • mpa92643@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          “Approximately equal” is just a superset of “equal” that also includes values “acceptably close” (using whatever definition you set for acceptable).

          Unless you say something like:

          a ≈ b ∧ a ≠ b

          which implies a is close to b but not exactly equal to b, it’s safe to presume that a ≈ b includes the possibility that a = b.

        • myslsl@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          Yes, informally in the sense that the error between the two numbers is “arbitrarily small”. Sometimes in introductory real analysis courses you see an exercise like: “prove if x, y are real numbers such that x=y, then for any real epsilon > 0 we have |x - y| < epsilon.” Which is a more rigorous way to say roughly the same thing. Going back to informality, if you give any required degree of accuracy (epsilon), then the error between x and y (which are the same number), is less than your required degree of accuracy

    • RustyNova@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Nah. They are supposed to not care about stuff and just roll with it without any regrets.

      It’s just like the wojak crying with the mask on, but not crying behind it.

      There’s plenty of cases of memes where the giga chad is just plainly wrong, but they just don’t care. But it’s not supposed to be in a troll way. The giga chad applies what it believes in. If you want a troll, there’s troll face, who speak with the confidence of a giga chad, but know he is bullshiting

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      There’s a Real Analysis proof for it and everything.

      Basically boils down to

      • If 0.(9) != 1 then there must be some value between 0.(9) and 1.
      • We know such a number cannot exist, because for any given discrete value (say 0.999…9) there is a number (0.999…99) that is between that discrete value and 0.(9)
      • Therefore, no value exists between 0.(9) and 1.
      • So 0.(9) = 1
      • Kairos@lemmy.today
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        4 months ago

        Even simpler: 1 = 3 * 1/3

        1/3 =0.333333…

        1/3 + 1/3 + 1/3 = 0.99999999… = 1

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          Even simpler

          0.99999999… = 1

          But you’re just restating the premise here. You haven’t proven the two are equal.

          1/3 =0.333333…

          This step

          1/3 + 1/3 + 1/3 = 0.99999999…

          And this step

          Aren’t well-defined. You’re relying on division short-hand rather than a real proof.

      • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
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        4 months ago

        the explanation (not proof tbf) that actually satisfies my brain is that we’re dealing with infinite repeating digits here, which is what allows something that on the surface doesn’t make sense to actually be true.

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          Infinite repeating digits produce what is understood as a Limit. And Limits are fundamental to proof-based mathematics, when your goal is to demonstrate an infinite sum or series has a finite total.

  • rustyfish@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    Remember when US politicians argued about declaring Pi to 3?

    Would have been funny seeing the world go boink in about a week.

  • HexesofVexes@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    Reals are just point cores of dressed Cauchy sequences of naturals (think of it as a continually constructed set of narrowing intervals “homing in” on the real being constructed). The intervals shrink at the same rate generally.

    1!=0.999 iff we can find an n, such that the intervals no longer overlap at that n. This would imply a layer of absolute infinite thinness has to exist, and so we have reached a contradiction as it would have to have a width smaller than every positive real (there is no smallest real >0).

    Therefore 0.999…=1.

    However, we can argue that 1 is not identity to 0.999… quite easily as they are not the same thing.

    This does argue that this only works in an extensional setting (which is the norm for most mathematics).

  • BachenBenno@feddit.de
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    4 months ago

    Mathematics is built on axioms that have nothing to do with numbers yet. That means that things like decimal numbers need definitions. And in the definition of decimals is literally included that if you have only nines at a certain point behind the dot, it is the same as increasing the decimal in front of the first nine by one.

    • aoidenpa@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      That’s not how it’s defined. 0.99… is the limit of a sequence and it is precisely 1. 0.99… is the summation of infinite number of numbers and we don’t know how to do that if it isn’t defined. (0.9 + 0.09 + 0.009…) It is defined by the limit of the partial sums, 0.9, 0.99, 0.999… The limit of this sequence is 1. Sorry if this came out rude. It is more of a general comment.

      • BachenBenno@feddit.de
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        4 months ago

        I study mathematics at university and I remember it being in the definition, but since it follows from the sum’s limit anyways it probably was just there for claritie’s sake. So I guess we’re both right…

  • Codex@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    Even the hyperreal numbers *R, which include infinitesimals, define 1 == .999…

  • LordCrom@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    I can honestly say I learned something from the comment section. I was always taught the .9 repeating was not equal to 1 but separated by imaginary i … Or infinitely close to 1 without becoming 1.