Timeline for Another chicken or egg: sequence or series
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
7 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 5, 2013 at 23:23 | comment | added | Frank Thorne | @Amir: Point well taken! | |
| May 5, 2013 at 19:34 | comment | added | Amir Asghari | I am pretty sure that we should give the credit of that "almost-complete nonsense" you have mentioned to Euler :) | |
| Aug 27, 2012 at 9:36 | comment | added | Wadim Zudilin | I definitely like your point, Frank. Your example with $e$ could be acomplished with the limit of $(1+1/n)^n$ as $n\to\infty$, which is extremely useful in showing many other limits but at the same time impractical for actual computation of $e$. The series, on other hand, can be successfully used not only to compute the number but also to demonstrate its irrationality to a first year undergrad. | |
| Aug 26, 2012 at 15:10 | comment | added | Suvrit | (I know, I was just being snide because of the "natural" in there) | |
| Aug 26, 2012 at 15:06 | comment | added | Frank Thorne | This is a calculus class. Addition is defined. | |
| Aug 26, 2012 at 14:51 | comment | added | Suvrit | really? series are just situations where elements of a sequence get added. we could be doing other stuff like multiplication, exponentiation, transformation, etc. etc., with elements of a sequence---so I don't really agree with it is "natural" to introduce series first...what if the elements of our sequence do not come from a space where addition is defined? we can still have sequences.... | |
| Aug 26, 2012 at 14:46 | history | answered | Frank Thorne | CC BY-SA 3.0 |