As a layperson who is interested in math, imaginary numbers always fascinated me. Like in the real world you taking the square of a negative makes no sense whatso ever, but in theoretical math you can just invent new imaginary numbers, make it so that *i*^2 = -1 and suddenly you have just revolutionized math. If this is useful, why can’t you break other rules and account for them with new imaginary symbols?
So let’s pretend that we call them made up numbers and use *m* to represent them. Why is *m*=1/0 impossible when something like *i*^2 = -1 is not?
In: 27
Lots of answers are giving good reasons why you can’t. But I would actually argue, you can, but people won’t use your new framework or your new mathematics until you prove that it can be useful. You can invent rules if you like, but the rules that we end up teaching everyone are the rules that end up being useful.
The reason imaginary numbers are revolutionary is because they seem totally wrong, but are very very useful.
Latest Answers