Not A Number - Blog Posts

one propaganda, because there isn’t enough of that yet

-1, 0, 1, and 2 are the most important numbers. they are the basis of the integers, each of them providing something unique that every other integer builds off of.

all the other types of numbers, from rationals to reals to complex to transcendental, build off of the integers.

NaN, on the other hand, is the basis of nothing, and isn’t even that interesting on it’s own. I’ve been programming and dealing with floating-point numbers for years, and do you know how many times NaN has come in useful? precisely zero. even calculations that ‘should’ result in NaN, like dividing by zero, usually don’t even use it, instead just throwing an error. why? because an error is more useful than a NaN the vast majority of the time.

you know what NaN is? floating point filler. there were a bunch of bit representations left over (16,777,214 for the standard, 32-bit float) and the designers of the IEEE 754 float decided to make them all NaN because they didn’t know what else to use them for.

Number Tournament: ONE vs NOT A NUMBER

[link to all polls]

1 (one)

seed: 10 (46 nominations)

previous opponent: tau

class: absolute unit

definition: the only positive integer that cannot be classified as either prime (exactly two factors) or composite (more than two factors)

NaN (not a number)

seed: 26 (20 nominations)

previous opponent: mute

class: ERROR

definition: ERROR