I might have just disproved math.

[Okysho]

I wanted to know zero divided by zero equals. I tried to do at algebraically. This is what I did:

-The answer I was trying to get will be represented by x
0/0=x
-I times both sides by zero
0=0x

I've only got a few seconds but here's your first mistake. You can't do this. It's bad math. When you multiply both sides by zero, it's not just "moving one digit from one side to the other" you're creating an x/x situation (which equals 1) 0/0 is undefinded therefore by your equation in this multiplication step:

0/0=x
0(0)/0 = 0(x)
but you're still left with a 0/0 it cannot divide out to make 1.

Here's what you're doing without using 0.

x/7 = y
7(x)/7 = y(7)
x = y(7)

See the error?

This is not the error. It is not 0(0)/0 it is 0(0/0) and as we all know anything times 0 equals 0 so the entire side is 0 thus 0=x0. The error is me saying x=0 when x does not, it just can equal 0.

You still can't do that mathematical operation. Again, the beginning of your proof is based on the simple mathematical principal of "moving from one side to the other" which is in fact creating an x/x = 1 situation.

What you've just told me still doesn't hold up though. 0(0/0) won't evaluate to 0=x(0) (for one thing 0/0 is undefined, but let's roll with it) you'll wind up with 0=x, therefore 0=0 and still doesn't disprove that x/0 is undefined (as in indeterminate) ...

Oddly enough, (contrary to what the great Yahtzee says) Alice in wonderland is a book about how silly mathematics is.

 

[asacatman]

snip

snip

Thanks, you answered my question, even if I didn't totally understand the answer. (mostly through this being a topic I'm a bit ignorant about, despite doing some elementary group theory.)

 

[Grygor]

That part was actually a joke, the imaginery VS real bit. However, I'm going to need some citation on the part of you stating that imaginery numbers have an application beyond thought experiment. Since 'i' is literally representing a paradox, and that this is actually the tamest aspect of math acting less like science and more like philosophy, it smacks of carelessness. "We didn't feel like figuring out where this leftover piece of the puzzle actually comes from, so here, have a Lowercase-I."

As has been mentioned before, i is not a paradox - the letter is a representation of a number that, when squared, is equal to -1. The thing about i is it does not lie on the real number line (hence the term "imaginary"), because it is not a member of the set of real numbers (pretty much by definition, because any real number times itself cannot be less than 0).

But the set of complex numbers, of which i is a member, does not take the form of a line - it's a plane, and because of this fact, the complex numbers have certain properties that the real numbers don't. For example, every root of every complex number is itself a complex number. (For real numbers, this is only true for roots of positive numbers and even roots of negative numbers - all other roots of negative numbers are complex numbers, of which the real numbers are a subset.)

The mathematics of the complex plane give rise to a special identity, e^(i*pi)+1=0, aka Euler's Identity. One of the consequences of this identity is that using complex numbers greatly simplifies the analysis and design of digital signal filters.

To say nothing of the quaternions, a higher-dimension analog of the complex plane in which -1 has three square roots, labeled i, j, and k. One notable use of quaternions is as a representation of camera rotations and orientations in 3D games that allows for freely-rotating cameras that are immune to Gimbal Lock.

In short, just because you can't personally see applications for a given bit of math, doesn't mean those applications don't exist.

 

[careful]

Everyone who says "you cannot divide by 0" has never taken calculus.

So, I have an interesting math based question. If you don't like/hate math or don't understand basic algebra(I understand if you don't) just hit the big THE ESCAPIST logo in the corner ...snip... 0/0 also then x=0
-If you fallowed so far and remember that x can be any number then that means zero can also be any and every number. So 0 can now equal 5 or any other number.

I realize something is most likely wrong here.
So tell me escapist, Did i Disprove math?

None of your math is incorrect, but your conclusion is slightly off.

What you are doing here is better dealt with with calculus than algebra, but the short version is this:

First, you are correct in saying that 0 divided by 0 MIGHT equal a number.

Calculus shows that 0 divided by 0 has four possible answers.
Those answers are 0, 1, undefined, or infinity.

It all depends on what the actual value of 0 is.


So, no, you did not disprove math. What you actually did was discover some very developed mathematical ideas.

i dont mean to be a party pooper, but this is wrong. 0 plays a role in the methods of calculus, but before calculus was even discovered the definition of 0, and all its interesting properties, had been solidified and accepted. see thread here on the escapist titled

Dividing by zero, the truth (this is long!)

 

[nsqared]

No. You didn't. It's like trying to disprove the fact that you have ten fingers by repeatedly counting them and every time you get 10 you say you made a mistake and have another go.

 

[rayen020]

no you did not and cannot disprove math. At best you found a fallacy and even then its probably a known fallacy.

 

[Guardian of Nekops]

Multiplying both sides of the equation by zero is eqivalent to wiping the equation off the blackboard. It makes the value of both sides of the equation zero for sure, but in the process it destroys any meaning the equation might have had.

At the end of the day, all you've 'proved' is that zero equals zero.

 

[funguy2121]

So, I have an interesting math based question. If you don't like/hate math or don't understand basic algebra(I understand if you don't) just hit the big THE ESCAPIST logo in the corner and that will bring you home.

I wanted to know zero divided by zero equals. I tried to do at algebraically. This is what I did:

-The answer I was trying to get will be represented by x
0/0=x
-I Multiply both sides by zero
0=0x
-This equals out to be 0=0 because anything times 0 is 0.
-This proves that x can be any number. for example if 5=x than 0=5*0 still is 0=0
-I rearrange 0=0x to be:
0/x=0
-Now since x can be any number now lets say x=0
-That makes this:
0/0=0
-And since x=0/0 (Right in the beginning^) and 0=0/0 also then x=0
-If you fallowed so far and remember that x can be any number then that means zero can also be any and every number. So 0 can now equal 5 or any other number.

I realize something is most likely wrong here.
So tell me escapist, Did i Disprove math?
Edit: I see the error now. Its not that x equals 0 its that at one point x CAN = 0

...ninja'd by OP himself. The larger point I'd make is that Zero always = nothing. It's representative of something that doesn't exist; it's a unique, even singular, number.

 

[milna64]

Is this now 6 pages of people saying "you can't divide by 0"?

 

[Kuroneko97]

You can't divide by zero.

Why not?

Oh God. If there was any doubts by anyone that you knew math, this just verified them.

This is a basic rule of math. Go back to Elementary school.

I figured this was going to be stupid the moment I read the title of this thread, and now I have been proven correct. Unlike your math.

 

[USSR]

I believe this thread has been done before.
Next time, try to google your theory before posting it.

It would save you from half of this community being dicks towards you.

 

[sean360h]

You can't divide by zero.

Why not?

Its Infinite how many times does any number go into zero? Infinity its called an Asymptote

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymptote

 

[Hasido]

anytime anyone ever thinks that they have "disproved math" they almost always have divided by zero somewhere along the way.

just saying, its one of the most overlooked mistakes it seems.

 

[Zack1501]

You can't divide by zero.

Why not?

Oh God. If there was any doubts by anyone that you knew math, this just verified them.

This is a basic rule of math. Go back to Elementary school.

I figured this was going to be stupid the moment I read the title of this thread, and now I have been proven correct. Unlike your math.

Again, why not? I'm not saying its not true or that I don't know why, I want you to tell me WHY I can't.

 

[Mattismen]

x/0.5 = 2x
Which means that if I put all of my apples in half a pile I would get twice as many!

Just had to put that out there

 

[Mau95]

So, I have an interesting math based question. If you don't like/hate math or don't understand basic algebra(I understand if you don't) just hit the big THE ESCAPIST logo in the corner and that will bring you home.

I wanted to know zero divided by zero equals. I tried to do at algebraically. This is what I did:

-The answer I was trying to get will be represented by x
0/0=x
-I times both sides by zero
0=0x
-This equals out to be 0=0 because anything times 0 is 0.
-This proves that x can be any number. for example if 5=x than 0=5*0 still is 0=0
-I rearrange 0=0x to be:
0/x=0
-Now since x can be any number now lets say x=0
-That makes this:
0/0=0
-And since x=0/0 (Right in the beginning^) and 0=0/0 also then x=0
-If you fallowed so far and remember that x can be any number then that means zero can also be any and every number. So 0 can now equal 5 or any other number.

I realize something is most likely wrong here.
So tell me escapist, Did i Disprove math?

Disproved math? No. Proved that you hardly know anything about math? Yes.

I bolded the part where you completely missed the point and made a conclusion that could only be characterized as and "ass pull", because 0/0 is an undefined expression.

So if 0/0=x and 0/0=0 then 0 does not equal x? I don't understand what you mean, please elaborate. I actuality want to understand why this is wrong past the usual argument of "Well you just cant divide by zero" That might be true but i have yet to find a person to tell me why I cant.

Dividing means putting something in a number of boxes (divide by 1, get one box of numbers; divide by two, number gets placed in 2 boxes;...). You can't put something in zero boxes. Some people claim you get infinity, but that's actually an approximation of the actual number that is used in slightly more complicated math with graphs and limits.

 

[Naeo]

1. 0/0 looks like it should equal 0, but it does not. It is undefined, since you're dividing by zero. The rule is "if you divide by zero, it's undefined".

2. You say that "x can be any number". Well, yes, by definition it can be, that's why it's a variable.

3. You get to the point of "0/x = 0". This is not something where you need to bother with what x is or evaluating or plugging in for x--zero divided by anything is zero. But again, see point 1, since dividing by zero is always the exception.

4. You set up a specific equation and solved it for x. Even assuming that 0/0 = 0 and is not undefined, there is still absolutely no possible logical jump you can make to get from "x=0, so 0 can equal any number". It seems like you completely misunderstood the basic concept of a variable: a variableis something you use to stand in for a value or an expression. In this case, there is only value of x that satisfies your equation (again, ignoring the 0/0 problem), and you solved for it. Here, "x" can represent any number only in so far as it can represent any single number, which is already pre-determined by the equation. "x" does not mean "any number you like," it means "there is only one possible value for this, and I don't know what it is yet, so I'm just calling it 'x' until I figure it out." That value can be any value, yes, but "x" only represents that one individual value.

 

[Sarge034]

So, I have an interesting math based question. If you don't like/hate math or don't understand basic algebra(I understand if you don't) just hit the big THE ESCAPIST logo in the corner and that will bring you home.

I wanted to know zero divided by zero equals. I tried to do at algebraically. This is what I did:

-The answer I was trying to get will be represented by x
0/0=x
-I Multiply both sides by zero
0=0x
-This equals out to be 0=0 because anything times 0 is 0.
-This proves that x can be any number. for example if 5=x than 0=5*0 still is 0=0
-I rearrange 0=0x to be:
0/x=0
-Now since x can be any number now lets say x=0
-That makes this:
0/0=0
-And since x=0/0 (Right in the beginning^) and 0=0/0 also then x=0
-If you fallowed so far and remember that x can be any number then that means zero can also be any and every number. So 0 can now equal 5 or any other number.

I realize something is most likely wrong here.
So tell me escapist, Did i Disprove math?
Edit: I see the error now. Its not that x equals 0 its that at one point x CAN = 0

You think that is interesting? Try this on for size.

infinity / 2 = 0.5 infinity = infinity
infinity + 0.5 infinity = 1.5 infinity = infinity
infinity / 0.5 infinity = 2 infinity = infinity
0.5 infinity = 1.5 infinity = 2 infinity = infinity

whole number (wn) infinity < real number (rn) infinity
yet wn infinity = rn infinity
because infinity = infinity

There are different sizes of infinity that are infinitely equal.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=strange-but-true-infinity-comes-in-different-sizes

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Cantor

Off topic- WTF?!?!?!?!?! How am I supposed to type Arabic?