Difference between revisions of "Real numbers"

Latest revision as of 15:45, November 11, 2011

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Real number

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-Real numbers can be thought of as numbers which can be represented by some infinite or finite decimal representation, such as 0.707106781187...
+#REDIRECT [[Real number]]
-In classical physics, measurements of things that can vary smoothly and continuously, like speed or temperature, are treated as real numbers.
-In a number line representation, the real numbers correspond to all the points on a geometric line. The distance between any two points on a line is a real number.
-In computer programming, some computer languages such as FORTRAN include a ''real'' data type that is intended to represent real numbers.<ref>In reality, the actual values the computer uses are very-high-precision fractions which can equal or approximate real numbers</ref>
-The real numbers include within them all of these other kinds of numbers:
-*The "natural numbers" or positive integers, 1, 2, 3, ...
-*Zero and the negative integers
-*Fractions, like 355/113
-*Any decimal representation which terminates (comes to an end), like 6.023, because this is just a way of writing a fraction (in this case, 6023/1000)
-*Any decimal representation which repeats or recurs, like 1.86292929292929..., because these can be shown to be fractions
-*Irrational numbers, like &sqrt;10 = 3.162277660168... &pi; = 3.1415926525..., whose decimal representations never repeat or terminate.
-==Formal definition==
-Formally, real numbers are defined as the unique [[Field (mathematics)|field]] which is [[Ordered]], [[Complete (mathematics)|Complete]], and [[Archimedean]]. The reals can be constructed from the rationals by means of [[Dedekind cuts]] or [[Cauchy Sequences]].
-==Infinity==
-The real numbers ''do not'' include <math>\infty</math> or <math>-\infty</math> (infinity and minus infinity). The reals contain ''an infinite number of finite numbers.''
-There is no largest real number, because you can always make a real number larger by adding 1 (or 137.035 or 6.023&middot;10<sup>23</sup>) to it, and no smallest real number, because you can always make a real number smaller by subtracting from it.
-Every real number is finite. One way to see this is to observe that you cannot subtract infinity from itself&mdash;the result is indeterminate&mdash;but, for any real number x, x - x = 0, exactly.
-It is sometimes convenient to have a set of numbers that ''does'' include infinity. For example, in computer programming, "real arithmetic" is often done by a specific system defined by standard IEEE 754-1985; this system is built in to modern processor chips. It provides for values which print out as INF and -INF and which participate in arithmetic as if they were numbers. Thus, division by zero, which was often an error that stopped calculation on older machines, can be a legal operation which simply produces a +INF or -INF result. The system of numbers implemented in IEEE 754 is known in mathematics as the "affinely extended real numbers."
-==Notes and references==
-<references/>

Difference between revisions of "Real numbers"

Latest revision as of 15:45, November 11, 2011

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