Re:Are real numbers really real?
by gweinberg on Tuesday June 12, 2018 @11:57AM
(#17294527)
Isn't it the opposite, more like 100% everywhere you don't look, and nowhere you do? I think the really real numbers are the countable subset of them which are in some way expressible, and the uncountable subset which are in no way expressible except in vague generalities like "they're not shaved by the barber" are in a sense less real.
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Re:Are real numbers really real?
by function_seven on Tuesday June 12, 2018 @12:17PM
(#17294764)
I like your definition of "look".
I was going with where a dart* would land (100% of the time it will "really" hit a point that can't be expressed using computable numbers), but you're using it to mean anything we can compute or express. That is, if we're looking somewhere, it has to be somewhere we can say that we're looking, and therefore expressible. If we take your meaning, then yeah, that's what I mean as well :)
* (Yes, the dart is an abstract one. No comments about the Planck length, please)
Re:Are real numbers really real?
by unkulunkulu on Tuesday June 12, 2018 @12:37PM
(#17294985)
The example with the dart plays into the «random numbers» notion, i.e. you have to use some kind of random process to get hold (non-constructively) of such a number.