Comment on I just cited myself.

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Tlaloc_Temporal@lemmy.ca ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

Eh, if you need special rules for 0.999… because the special rules for all other repeating decimals failed, I think we should just accept that the system doesn’t work here. We can keep using the workaround, but stop telling people they’re wrong for using the system correctly.

The deeper understanding of numbers where 0.999… = 1 is obvious needs a foundation of much more advanced math than just decimals, at which point decimals stop being a system and are just a quirky representation.

Saying decimals are a perfect system is the issue I have here, and I don’t think this will go away any time soon. Mathematicians like to speak in absolutely terms where everything is either perfect or discarded, yet decimals seem to be too simple and basal to get that treatment. No one seems to be willing to admit the limitations of the system.

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