On 18/09/17 16:29, Ben Bacarisse wrote:
Steve D'Aprano <steve+pyt...@pearwood.info> writes:
<snip>
To answer your question, what do I mean by int/int being undefined, I'd have to
dig into areas of maths that either weren't taught in the undergrad courses I
did, or that I've long since forgotten about. Something
about... fields?
<snip>
This is a pretty specialised area of maths. You won't learn anything
about it in high school. And possibly not undergrad maths degrees. I
seem to vaguely recall just barely touching on groups, but not rings
or fields.
When you said before that you thought that undefined division was rather
obscure I was going to mention that it's the basic difference between a
ring and a field; the intent being that you'd go "oh, yes, of course
it's not obscure at all". I'm glad I didn't now, because you would not
have seen it as the simple notion I expected!
Teaching rings and fields is (or at least was 30 or so years ago) 1st
year undergraduate maths here in the UK. Maybe it's changed.
I think I achieved a nodding acquaintance with rings, fields and vector
spaces in Further Maths (pre-university), and then got the real deal in
my first term at university. I think they now happen later in the first
year; looking at the on-line syllabus, the first two terms of IA Maths
are now full of things that used to be taught at A-level.
--
Rhodri James *-* Kynesim Ltd
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