On Sat, Nov 16, 2013 at 3:00 PM, km <[email protected]> wrote:
> A fair reason for the outer enclosing box is that in math a list and a set 
> are different.

But in math a 5 and a 5 can be different, for example if one of them
is feet and the other is seconds, or in any of a variety of other
circumstances. (For example, one might be a constant and another might
be a non-unique valid example of an otherwise free variable.)

On the other hand, we can use five apples to represent five seconds,
for example in a classroom discussion where we need a placeholder as a
part of the discussion. Or, perhaps a different kind of seconds if we
are talking about a second helping of dessert?

These distinctions though, appear in our uses of language rather than
in the language itself.

I hope this helps.

-- 
Raul
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