oh holy of hole-y number lines

[trochee]

through rootedinsong I discovered the steaming morass that is people who don't get that mathematics has been fairly well worked-out over the last, say, three millenia, and who are re-drowning Hippasus.

basically, imagine: trolling in 2009 over a point of mathematics settled (albeit violently) in the 5th century BC.

[ETA: actually, it's not even an argument about the irrationals -- it's a troll over whether repeating decimals are "really" the same thing as a fraction. and it's 2006, not 2009. but still.]

[ETA again: the debate rages on in Wikipedia's talk page on this subject!]

Comments

[marnanel.livejournal.com]

BEWARE. Last time I posted about this I soon had sixty comments appear telling me I was wrong. Someone else had their work described as lesbian algebra.

[rootedinsong.livejournal.com]

That's an awfully... strange coincidence, given the end of my original post.

[trochee.livejournal.com]

rootedinsong, I suppose I can link to your post?

[rootedinsong.livejournal.com]

Yes. :)

[marnanel.livejournal.com]

Perhaps mathematicians and queerfolk are regarded with similar suspicion by the general population!

[trochee.livejournal.com]

i love it. bring on the flame war; I will stolidly defend the honor of the geometric series.

[diego001.livejournal.com]

These people make the baby Alan Turing cry.