I know of at least one other forum that agrees with you.
I do not agree. I have seen it defined as less than a very small number. Here is how the physicists think about it.
Infinity isn't a uniquely defined concept. There are many ways to include infinity (infinities) into a number system, each with their own properties.
The most common one is the example plus gave of the extended real numbers; in that system 1 / infinity is defined simply to be zero, because that's the choice that gives the right answer for the applications for which the extended real numbers were invented.
Other number systems behave differently. 1 / infinity is undefined for any infinite quantity in the ordinal number system. In other transfinite systems each infinite value has a unique nonzero reciprical (an infinitessimal).
Interestingly Mathematica, Maple, Derive and Mupad ( I know because I think I helped put it there ) will evaluate 1 / ∞ = 0. This is because in practical problems you would be thinking in terms of the limit.
To me 1 / ∞ is meaningless. I do not like the idea of it equaling a very small number. For computational sake one could consider it 0. That is why the math packages define it that way.
When I am forced to think about it, I think about it in terms of limits, then it equals 0.
http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/62486.html
http://mathcentral.uregina.ca/QQ/databa … evan1.html
I like this one best. In our number system the question is improper.
It seems that every time someone constructs a number system that includes infinity, they get not just one, but a whole lot of different infinite numbers. So the answer to the original question "what is 1/infinity" is that...
---in the standard system:
"you can't ask that."---in the nonstandard system and the surreals:
"it will be one of the nonzero infinitesimal numbers, which infinity did you have in mind?"
How about this one?
]]>Like, if you knew that a hen could lay 2 eggs in a day and wanted to work out how many days it had been in the henhouse if you found 10 eggs lying there.
10 eggs/(2eggs/day) = 5 days.
]]>My attempt: 100!×(Length of Pi tail when written in size 24 expressed in tenths of nanometres) zeroes
]]>1: has knowledge
10: is aware of own knowledge level
So:
0: knows not that he knows not
1: knows not that he knows
10: knows that he knows not
11: knows that he knows
1 2 rank
1 0 0 fool
2 0 1 student
3 1 0 asleep
4 1 1 wise man
statement 1=if he knows/knows not about the world
statement 2=is he knows/knows not about if he knows of knows not about the world
In the beginning I was confused, because I thought 3 factors were present but soon realised only 2 were.I have the idea I have missed something important in this one.
]]>