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Eh, it's fair to call i a complex number. I mean C includes the imaginary line.
by ravi-delia 5y ago
Eh, it's fair to call i a complex number. I mean C includes the imaginary line.
- Jtsummers 5y agoai is a complex number and an imaginary, but not all complex numbers are imaginary numbers (like square/rectangle). a+bi is a complex number, but not an imaginary number. And a is a complex number and a real number. Which is the problem with trying to reduce it this way, you lose the ability to distinguish (by name) the two components of a complex number. What are the two parts of a complex number called if we drop real and imaginary?
- ravi-delia 5y ago> What are the two parts of a complex number called if we drop real and imaginary? Real and imaginary! I'm not saying we should never use the work imaginary, I'm just saying that what makes i interesting is not that it's an imaginary number, but that it's a complex number. The imaginaries on their own aren't a number system at all, and rarely come up in isolation. Objecting in introducing sqrt(-1) as a complex number seems a little silly.
- bee_rider 5y agoIt is equally fair to call i and 1 complex numbers.
- ravi-delia 5y agoI don't think that's a very fair comparison. You wind up with 1 when trying to make every number system from the naturals up. The imaginaries basically never come up except when using complex numbers in general, and certainly don't in the high-school and undergrad classes where people first learn about them.