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[-] wellbuddyweek@lemm.ee 80 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Actually, those are not the same. Natural numbers include zero, positive integers do not. She shoud definately use 'big naturals'.

Edit: although you could argue that it doesnt matter as 0 is arguably neither big nor large

[-] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 61 points 2 months ago

Natural numbers only include zero if you define it so in the beginning of your book/paper/whatever. Otherwise it's ambiguous and you should be ashamed of yourself.

[-] wellbuddyweek@lemm.ee 8 points 2 months ago

Fair enough, as a computer scientist I got tought to use the Neumann definition, which includes zero, unless stated differently by the author. But for general mathematics, I guess it's used both ways.

[-] Zwiebel@feddit.org 45 points 2 months ago

Natural numbers include zero

That is a divisive opinion and not actually a fact

[-] kogasa@programming.dev 5 points 2 months ago

Yeah, it's a matter of convention rather than opinion really, but among US academia the convention is to exclude 0 from the naturals. I think in France they include it.

[-] SchwertImStein@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 months ago

positive interers with addition are not a monoid though, since the identity element of addition is 0

[-] lengau@midwest.social 0 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yeah I find it easier to just accept the terminology of natural numbers and whole numbers so we have simple names for both.

[-] errer@lemmy.world 30 points 2 months ago

Big naturals in fact include two zeroes:

(o ) ( o)

Spaces and parens added for clarity

[-] Jerkface@lemmy.world 19 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

(0 ) ( 0)
You can't fool me.

[-] Quadhammer@lemmy.world 8 points 2 months ago

(o Y o) solve for Y

[-] bampop@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago

When enclosed in parentheses I believe the correct term is "bolt-ons"

[-] peregrin5@lemm.ee 12 points 2 months ago

Depends on how you draw it.

[-] stebo02@sopuli.xyz 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Strictly positive numbers, Z~0~^+^, don't include zero. Positive numbers aka naturals, Z^+^ = N, do.

Edit: this is what I've learned at school, but according to wikipedia the definitions of these vary quite a bit

[-] davidagain@lemmy.world -3 points 2 months ago

Natural numbers include zero

Only if you're French or a computer scientist or something! No one else counts from zero.

There's nothing natural about zero. The famously organized and inventive Roman Empire did fine without it and it wasn't a popular concept in Europe until the early thirteenth century.

If zero were natural like 1, 2, 3, 4, then all cultures would have counted from zero, but they absolutely did not.

[-] SchwertImStein@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 2 months ago

american education system moment?

this post was submitted on 04 Jun 2025
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