Re: naive question from a non-mathematician

Stephen Montgomery-Smith schrieb:
David C. Ullrich wrote:
On Sun, 28 May 2006 18:12:02 GMT, Stephen Montgomery-Smith
<stephen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


G.E. Ivey wrote:

It's hard for me to believe this has gone on so long. While every "quibble" is correct (and mathematicians love quibbles!) John Smith did say "mathematically equivalent", not "identical" or "the same" or "equal" so I would have no trouble at all accepting "Yes, they are mathematically equivalent".

That's a great answer.

So it's up to generalisation:
Is there in the whole area of maths any structure with a
multiplication, where
0 * something is different from 0? And is there any structure with an
addition, where
something + 0 is different from something? After all, 0 is considered
as { } or the empty set and as the neutral element of addition.
Friendly greetings
Hero
PS
..123 + 0.0i = 0.123 + 0.0 * i = 0.123 + 0 * i = 0.123 + 0 * sqrt ( - 1
) =
0.123 + sqrt ( 0 * 0 * ( - 1 ) ) = 0.123 + sqrt ( 0 ) = 0.123 + 0 =
0.123
and " = " means "of equal value".

.