Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!lll-tis!ames!ptsfa!rtech!llama!jas
From: jas@llama.rtech.UUCP (Jim Shankland)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Is 0 a unique number? (was: Re: exit(-1), 0 is sometimes magic)
Message-ID: <1595@rtech.UUCP>
Date: 18 Jan 88 18:18:00 GMT
References: <502@cresswell.quintus.UUCP> <6935@brl-smoke.ARPA> <1179@wjvax.UUCP> <6983@brl-smoke.ARPA> <7208@ki4pv.uucp> <23160@cca.CCA.COM> <1843@bsu-cs.UUCP> <2305@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> <1868@bsu-cs.UUCP>
Sender: news@rtech.UUCP
Reply-To: jas@rtech.UUCP (Jim Shankland)
Organization: Relational Technology, Inc. Alameda, CA
Lines: 22
Keywords: funny

In article <1868@bsu-cs.UUCP> dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
!I gave a number of example attempting to show that zero is inherently
!a unique integer....
!
!Zero symmetrically divides the number line.  If one had to choose ONE
!of the values on the number line as being unique, it would have to be
!zero.  It is the only value that isn't arbitrary, the only one that
!doesn't have a mirror-image counterpart (of opposite sign), the only
!one that can't be a legal divisor, the only one that, in short,
!stands out as "different" from all the other values.
!

It's not easy to make me laugh first thing in the morning; who ever
thought that a comp.lang.c posting could do it?  Sad to say,
I think the poster was serious; I saw no smiley-faces.  Lest we
divert bandwidth from the "C needs a power operator" discussion,
let me hastily concede that yes, 0 is a unique integer.  Next week's topic:
is 17 a unique integer?

Jim Shankland
  ..!ihnp4!cpsc6a!\
               sun!rtech!jas
 ..!ucbvax!mtxinu!/