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From: gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.ai,talk.philosophy.misc
Subject: Nonsense about the word 'infinte'
Message-ID: <17316@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 21 Nov 88 10:10:48 GMT
References: <490@soleil.UUCP> <14577@mimsy.UUCP> <1919@garth.UUCP>
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Reply-To: gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith)
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Organization: Garnet Gang Gems of Wisdom, Inc.
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In-reply-to: smryan@garth.UUCP (Steven Ryan)

In article <1919@garth.UUCP>, smryan@garth (Steven Ryan) writes:

>Just a short note that is a mortal sin for a mathematician to say
>`inf***ty.' Penance usually is usually five Hail Davids.

  Nonsense. "F(x) as x --> +infinity" is the sort of thing
everyone learns in Calculus, which shows that even Freshmen can
understand what it means.

>The word `infinite' only occurs before `set,' `infinite set,' where it has
>a very precise meaning.

  More nonsense. "Let p be an infinite prime number in a
nonstandard model of arithmetic", "consider now the place at
infinity", "the proof follows the method of infinite decent",
"consider the infinite product prod_{p \in P} (1 - p^{-s})", all
taken from number theory alone.

>The correct term is `arbitrary.'

  As in "by arbitrary fiat, Ryan attempted to tell mathematicians
how they could use the word, 'infinite'". Alas, they all laughed.

  Beat it.
--
ucbvax!garnet!gsmith    Gene Ward Smith/Brahmsgangster/Berkeley CA 94720
                 "Your notation sucks!"  Serge Lang