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Arguments Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 |
Moved to Arguments subpage
Right now, we have footnotes that are references and footnotes that are explanatory notes or asides, the former using {{sfnp}} and <ref> tags, the latter using <ref> tags. I propose wrapping the second kind in {{efn}} instead, which has what I consider the advantage of distinguishing between the two types of notes (efn get labeled [a], [b], etc. instead of [1], [2]). One disadvantage is that there are clearly some judgement calls to be made. How do other people feel about this? (Obviously this is not urgent, am happy to have "I'm busy trying to preserve featured status and don't want to think about/deal with this" as an answer.) -- JBL ( talk) 21:54, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
I realize the mathematicians love precision and thus those special words that have meaning in math, but this article has an important point for a broader audience. I change the intro yesterday to concentrate the ideas that "It is the number one!" into the first paragraph and move the two (or is it three or maybe one) definitions to a separate section. The waffle-worded, footnoted definition will be completely opaque to naive readers. They will stop reading and never discover "This number is equal to 1.". Unfortunately my change was reverted by @ Tito Omburo with an edit summary, "Restored old lede. It is important that the lede refer to an actual number, not merely some notation.", which I do not understand. Note that my lede was
In my opinion we should change the content back towards the version I suggested. Johnjbarton ( talk) 14:51, 27 June 2024 (UTC)
Does the argument in 0.999...#Impossibility of unique representation come from somewhere? Other than that, the sourcing seems OK. XOR'easter ( talk) 05:10, 29 June 2024 (UTC)
The article contains the statement
Every positional numeral system has two representations for certain numbers, but is this necessarily true of terminating representations? A counterexample would seem to be balanced ternary: the numbers that have two representations seem to be nonterminating, e.g. 1 = 1.000...bal3 has no other representation, but 1/2 = 0.111...bal3 = 1.TTT...bal3 (where T = −1) has two. Or maybe I need some coffee? — Quondum 01:56, 30 June 2024 (UTC)
As far as I understand, this section discusses supposed properties of all positional numeral systems
. But this supposes a precise definition of a positional numeral system, and of a positional numeral system that accepts infinite strings. Without such a definition, everything is original research.
As an example, the standard p-adic representation of p-adic numbers is an example of a positional numeral system such that there is always a unique representation.
By the way it is astonishing that nobody mention what is, in my opinion, the main reason for which there is so much confusion with the subject of the article: it is that "infinite decimals" make a systematic use of actual infinity, a concept that is so counterintuitive that, before the 20th century, it was refused by most mathematicians. It seems that some teachers hope that kids could understand easily concept that were refused by mathematicians and philosophers a century ago. D.Lazard ( talk) 16:44, 30 June 2024 (UTC)
![]() | This article is undergoing a
featured article review. A featured article should exemplify Wikipedia's very best work, and is therefore expected to
meet the criteria.
Please feel free to If the article has been moved from its initial review period to the Featured Article Removal Candidate (FARC) section, you may support or contest its removal. |
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
0.999... article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
Archives:
Index,
1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8,
9,
10,
11,
12,
13,
14,
15,
16,
17,
18,
19,
20Auto-archiving period: 31 days
![]() |
![]() | This is the talk page for discussing changes to the 0.999... article itself. Please place discussions on the underlying mathematical issues on the arguments page. For questions about the maths involved, try posting to the reference desk instead. |
Frequently asked questions
|
![]() | 0.999... is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so. | |||||||||||||||
![]() | This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on October 25, 2006. | |||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
Current status: Featured article |
![]() | This article is rated FA-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to multiple WikiProjects. | ||||||||||||||||||||
|
Arguments Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 |
Moved to Arguments subpage
Right now, we have footnotes that are references and footnotes that are explanatory notes or asides, the former using {{sfnp}} and <ref> tags, the latter using <ref> tags. I propose wrapping the second kind in {{efn}} instead, which has what I consider the advantage of distinguishing between the two types of notes (efn get labeled [a], [b], etc. instead of [1], [2]). One disadvantage is that there are clearly some judgement calls to be made. How do other people feel about this? (Obviously this is not urgent, am happy to have "I'm busy trying to preserve featured status and don't want to think about/deal with this" as an answer.) -- JBL ( talk) 21:54, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
I realize the mathematicians love precision and thus those special words that have meaning in math, but this article has an important point for a broader audience. I change the intro yesterday to concentrate the ideas that "It is the number one!" into the first paragraph and move the two (or is it three or maybe one) definitions to a separate section. The waffle-worded, footnoted definition will be completely opaque to naive readers. They will stop reading and never discover "This number is equal to 1.". Unfortunately my change was reverted by @ Tito Omburo with an edit summary, "Restored old lede. It is important that the lede refer to an actual number, not merely some notation.", which I do not understand. Note that my lede was
In my opinion we should change the content back towards the version I suggested. Johnjbarton ( talk) 14:51, 27 June 2024 (UTC)
Does the argument in 0.999...#Impossibility of unique representation come from somewhere? Other than that, the sourcing seems OK. XOR'easter ( talk) 05:10, 29 June 2024 (UTC)
The article contains the statement
Every positional numeral system has two representations for certain numbers, but is this necessarily true of terminating representations? A counterexample would seem to be balanced ternary: the numbers that have two representations seem to be nonterminating, e.g. 1 = 1.000...bal3 has no other representation, but 1/2 = 0.111...bal3 = 1.TTT...bal3 (where T = −1) has two. Or maybe I need some coffee? — Quondum 01:56, 30 June 2024 (UTC)
As far as I understand, this section discusses supposed properties of all positional numeral systems
. But this supposes a precise definition of a positional numeral system, and of a positional numeral system that accepts infinite strings. Without such a definition, everything is original research.
As an example, the standard p-adic representation of p-adic numbers is an example of a positional numeral system such that there is always a unique representation.
By the way it is astonishing that nobody mention what is, in my opinion, the main reason for which there is so much confusion with the subject of the article: it is that "infinite decimals" make a systematic use of actual infinity, a concept that is so counterintuitive that, before the 20th century, it was refused by most mathematicians. It seems that some teachers hope that kids could understand easily concept that were refused by mathematicians and philosophers a century ago. D.Lazard ( talk) 16:44, 30 June 2024 (UTC)