Re: (*) -> 1

[<tomas@tuxteam.de>]

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On Tue, Jan 17, 2023 at 07:29:32PM +0300, Jean Louis wrote:
> * Michael Heerdegen <michael_heerdegen@web.de> [2023-01-17 18:58]:
> > Jean Louis <bugs@gnu.support> writes:
> > 
> > > Convention in multiplication is that there must be two numbers, that
> > > is not followed, something else is followed.
> > 
> > There is no such convention.
> 
> Every elementary school is there to prove that convention of having at
> least two addends for addition and two factors for multiplication
> exists.

You shouldn't generalise what "every elementary school..." does. You
wouldn't have Bessel functions then.

Higher maths are a superset of (and sometimes a correction of) what
is taught in elementary schools. Lisp takes this inspiration from
higher maths. John McCarthy [1] was a mathematician by training and
most definitely had no qualms with zero- or one-term products and
sums. You have no choice but (believe me, I studied that too). As
soon as you have general sum and product formulae, you /need/ to
define what happens in border cases, and those conventions you seem
to dislike so much have turned out to be the most convenient,
probably since the mid-19th century.

But I think we've wrangled enough with this. At least me. If you don't
want to accept that others (including mathematicians) prefer other
conventions than you do... please, keep your bubble. I'll keep mine :)

I'm out of this.

Cheers
-- 
t

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