From: "Peter I. Hansen" <pih@oek.dk>
Subject: Re: Natural data type ?
Date: Thu, 28 Mar 2002 17:42:20 +0100
Date: 2002-03-28T17:42:20+01:00 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <3CA347EC.5000902@oek.dk> (raw)
In-Reply-To: a7vgei$mom$2@a1-hrz.uni-duisburg.de
Georg Bauhaus wrote:
>Peter I. Hansen <pih@oek.dk> wrote:
>: We learn in mathematics that the natural numbers are positive integers
>: not including zero..., So to me the 'Natural' way of defining these
>
>Natural, the way it is defined, allows me to very naturally
>answer the question, 'How many?'
>
>- Georg
>
No, this is a misunderstanding. The natural numbers are defined to be
the numbers you can count to. You can count to 1, you can count to 2,
you can count to 3, ... and so forth. You cannot count to Zero.
The question 'How many?' is the reason for defining other numbers than
natural.
'Q: How many apples did you eat ? A: 2 and a half (=2.5 a rational number)'.
/Peter
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2002-03-28 16:42 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 12+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2002-03-27 2:13 Natural data type ? Peter I. Hansen
2002-03-27 2:57 ` Chad R. Meiners
2002-03-27 23:18 ` Peter I. Hansen
2002-03-28 3:55 ` Chad R. Meiners
2002-03-28 15:40 ` Marin David Condic
2002-03-28 16:47 ` Peter I. Hansen
2002-03-27 14:25 ` Marin David Condic
2002-03-28 16:45 ` Peter I. Hansen
2002-03-28 16:30 ` Georg Bauhaus
2002-03-28 16:42 ` Peter I. Hansen [this message]
2002-03-28 18:33 ` Darren New
2002-03-29 16:19 ` Georg Bauhaus
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