A Third Math Topic: Imaginary (or Fake) Numbers

[twesterm]

Rath said:

Gnizmo said:

Lem_Nx said:

Rath said:

Wait, how do you divide by zero?

 

 

Limits, baby :D

Pretty much this. You look at the numbers as they get closer and closer to 0 and see where it converges and assume that must be what the number actually is at that point. This is one of the basic ideas behind derivatives.

Its not division by zero, its division close to zero. There is a fundamental difference between dividing between an infinitely small number and division by zero. Thats the reason why you always have to express it with limit notation (lim x-> 0 of 1/x is infinity) rather than 1/x is infinity.

There's always L^Hospital's rule (I don't care that I spelled it wrong).  It kind of lets you divide by 0 in very specific circumstances (lets you calculate certain limts that would equal 0/0 and some other ones).