eli5: Why haven’t mathematicians invented a symbol for x/0 like they have pi and imaginary numbers?
In: 277
Because x/0 doesn’t work consistently with the mathematics of finite numbers, basically – and there’s no point in giving a symbol to something that you’re not going to use. Dividing by zero breaks arithmetic and leads to invalid answers. Things like negative numbers and i (and, indeed, zero) may have seemed ludicrous when they were first proposed – but they’re well behaved and don’t mess the place up, so we give them house room. (They also turn out to be very useful, to boot.)
Pi is different, in that it’s a very specific number. It crops up all over the place – but it’s irrational, so the only practical way to write it down is to give it a name/symbol.
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