Tom Melly <tom### [at] tomandlucouk> wrote:

> "Geoff Wedig" <wed### [at] darwinepbicwruedu> wrote in message
> news:3a829d42@news.povray.org...
>> Tom Melly <tom### [at] tomandlucouk> wrote:
>> > There maybe an arguement, but it isn't a clear one. However, any
> arguement
>> > that says 2*3 is not 6 is plainly batty.
>>
>> Actually, there are plenty of number systems where this is plainly *not*
>> true.  There are the simple systems where 6 is undefined (base 4, for
>> example, where 2+3 = 11, or the mod 5 number system, where 2*3 = 2) and
> then

> Well, yes, obviously if you use any other system than decimal, then all bets
> are off. However, even recognising the validity of some of the arguements
> put forward, I still find it remarkably obtuse to argue that precedence is
> no more arbitary than what 1+1 equals (base 3 upwards ;)

Oh, yes.  Precedence is a convention, not a base assumption of mathematics. 
Precedence involves how systems of equations are written down, how they're
represented, not the equations themselves.  The equations are what's really
relevant, not their representation.  Representations have changed over the
years (the way Newton wrote out equations was *very* different from anything
we'd see today), but the math that was represented, that is what's
importatn, and that hasn't changed (well, been improved, modified, etc, but
nothing in it has become incorrect within its sphere)

Geoff

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