That doesnt make a difference. You can find the exact circumference of a circle, you just cant express it in the decimal system as a number (thats why we have a symbol for it so you can still express the exact value)
Comment on suck it, math nerds
gmtom@lemmy.world 8 months ago“Find” not “define”
HopFlop@discuss.tchncs.de 8 months ago
GnomeKat@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 months ago
Putting things in base 10 is also a definition. Digits aren’t special.
h3ndrik@feddit.de 8 months ago
Was going to say the same. Also π isn’t infinite. Far from it. it’s not even bigger than 4. It’s representation in the decimal system is just so that it can’t be written there with a finite number of decimal places. But you could just write “π”. It’s short, concise and exact.
DrSteveBrule@mander.xyz 8 months ago
Can pi be expressed with a finite amount of digits in another number system?
Donjuanme@lemmy.world 8 months ago
How about a pi based system, then pi is 1.
Solemn@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 months ago
I don’t think there’s any technical reason we can’t count in base pi
lolcatnip@reddthat.com 8 months ago
Not sure where you’re going with the decimal thing. Pi had infinite digits in any base because it’s irrational.
h3ndrik@feddit.de 8 months ago
I thought that was the joke in the comic? That we can’t know numbers exactly that have an infinite decimal expansion. That’d be true for some rational numbers like a third, if you change the basis of the numeral system it’d be different numbers. And irrational numbers too if you have a integer base. But I’d argue how we write down a number isn’t what determines ‘exactness’.
mrsemi@lemmy.world 8 months ago
What if I count in base pi