(no subject)

[icarus]

Hooray!

SNAFU is now listed under Beg Me For It on RS.org, and Stand In The Ruins has been sent in to them, as well as chapters 2-5 of Reunion.

Now I have to outline Reunion. Because it seems I have a WiP going. Whoops, how did that happen? I make no promises as to how long it takes me to update this story.

Life has finally levelled out a bit. No new word on wildernessguru's mom, but it's all good on that end. Now doing the school-schedule do-see-do. I'm trying to study my favourite subject (cue scary organ music and voice frosted with sarcasm): math.

But goseaward and sharp_tongue explained over the weekend that Algebra is the logic of describing lines, while Calculus is the logic of describing curves. Which, finally, at long last someone has given me a point to all this stuff! I may suck at it. My eyes may glaze over like someone's describing a really boring dream when someone fires numbers at me. But there is, in fact, a point to this stuff.

(Trig always made sense to me. I used it for my surveying class, and I used it to hand-calculate my astrology charts -- and you're not a real astrologer until you've calculated at least one chart by hand).

Comments

[ursula]

Yeah, but everyone makes the careless mistakes. I wrote 1 + 1 = 0 on a calculus exam once. They don't necessarily mean you're bad at math, any more than a habit of typing "teh" means you're a bad writer; they just mean that Proofreading Is A Good Skill.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm convinced there's a bizarre mathematical theory where 1 + 1 does equal 0. *smirks*

Icarus

[ursula]

Oh, there is. But you don't usually try to do calculus on it ;)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Let me guess: Projective Geometry?

Icarus

[ursula]

All sorts of things, actually. Algebraic topology, homological algebra, algebraic geometry . . .

The easiest model I can think of is a reflection in the plane. Doing nothing is 0; reflecting across the y-axis once is 1; reflecting again is 1+1, but that's just the same as doing nothing, so 0.

You can get a slightly more complicated model which allows for addition AND multiplication, in which case 1+1 = 2 = 0, 1+1+1+1 = 4 = 0, 1+1+1+1+1+1 = 6 = 0, so 2 x 4 = 0 x 0 = 0 = 6 ;)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

You can get a slightly more complicated model which allows for addition AND multiplication, in which case 1+1 = 2 = 0, 1+1+1+1 = 4 = 0, 1+1+1+1+1+1 = 6 = 0, so 2 x 4 = 0 x 0 = 0 = 6 ;)

LOL! You know, I've had days like that.

In fact, I'm kind of having one of those now.

Icarus