Skip to main content
23 events
when toggle format what by license comment
Nov 10, 2022 at 14:25 history unprotected Eric Wofsey
Nov 10, 2022 at 13:52 history protected Ѕᴀᴀᴅ
Jul 6, 2020 at 8:37 answer added tomasz timeline score: 4
May 12, 2020 at 0:13 audit First posts
May 12, 2020 at 0:13
May 8, 2020 at 6:36 audit First posts
May 8, 2020 at 6:36
May 5, 2020 at 18:29 comment added student By a "gap" he says that although rationals are arbitrarily close to $\sqrt{2}$ both smaller and larger than it, no rational is equal to $\sqrt{2}$ . So the mere fact that $\sqrt{2}$ is irrational does not in itself illustrate the assertion that the rational number system has "gaps". For example, $-1$ is never the square of a real number. But this fact alone does not say that the real number system has "gaps". It does not, the reals form a complete ordered field.
May 1, 2020 at 3:09 audit First posts
May 1, 2020 at 3:09
Apr 30, 2020 at 15:39 comment added Rex Butler This answer may be helpful math.stackexchange.com/a/95366/6455. There are physical and intuitive explanations for the use of the words "hole" and or "gap".
Apr 30, 2020 at 14:46 answer added user13618 timeline score: 13
Apr 30, 2020 at 11:53 audit First posts
Apr 30, 2020 at 11:53
Apr 30, 2020 at 3:15 answer added Paramanand Singh timeline score: 27
Apr 30, 2020 at 1:48 comment added fleablood But the hole comes in noting we can get close to it. We can hone in and find infinitely many $p_i$ and $q_i$ where $q_i-p_i$ can get as small as we like but $p_i^2 < 2 < q_i^2$. So the road between $p_i$ to $q_i$ ought to be "smooth" (they can be as close as we like) but the have a "jump" somehow we jump fro $p_i^2 < 2$ to $q_i^2> 2$ without passing a $r^2 = 2$ in between.
Apr 30, 2020 at 1:48 comment added fleablood 1) It's subtly but there is not reason to think that rationals not have a number $q$ so that $q^2=2$ is a "hole"? After all there is no rational number $q$ where $q$ has sharp teeth and eats rabbits, is a hole. And there is not rational number $q$ where $q^2=-1$ is a hole. $x^2=2$ could simply be... something that doesn't exist. ....
Apr 30, 2020 at 1:36 answer added David Pement timeline score: 21
Apr 30, 2020 at 1:10 comment added PM 2Ring FWIW, this {A, B} partition is called a Dedekind cut
Apr 29, 2020 at 23:49 history became hot network question
Apr 29, 2020 at 17:01 vote accept Larry
Apr 29, 2020 at 16:19 review Close votes
May 4, 2020 at 3:04
Apr 29, 2020 at 16:13 history edited Xander Henderson CC BY-SA 4.0
added 11 characters in body; edited title
Apr 29, 2020 at 16:09 answer added Xander Henderson timeline score: 55
Apr 29, 2020 at 16:09 answer added joriki timeline score: 112
Apr 29, 2020 at 15:51 review First posts
Apr 29, 2020 at 15:59
Apr 29, 2020 at 15:48 history asked Larry CC BY-SA 4.0