What’s the biggest number you can think of? When I was a child, it’s the kind of question we’d ask each other in the school playground. Someone would say something hopelessly naïve like “a billion billion billion”, only to be outstripped by a peer who knew about trillions, squillions or kajillions (it didn’t matter if […]
https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-a-mathematical-paradox-allows-infinite-cloning-20210826/
Mathematics is true: students know this, since there’s always a correct answer. The philosophers ask, “What is truth?” but the mathematician replies “Mathematics is Truth.” Mathematics is orderly: Algebra requires arithmetic, Trigonometry requires algebra, Geometry requires both. Mathematics teaches us about infinity: For any number, no matter how big, you can always find a bigger […]
Many students struggle to figure out what the gradient of a vertical line is. Here is one explanation:
This TED-Ed talk takes us backstage to figure out some complex ideas about infinity. Click to be amazed!
Here is a rather philosophical summary of the concept of Infinity:
Perhaps one of the best definitions of infinity was made by a Year 9 student who said that, “Infinity is the place where things happen that don’t”
The idea that parallel lines might meet has a lot to do with infinity. For example, when you look along railway tracks they seem to meet at a point in the distance. Also, on the earth, lines of longitude seem to be parallel yet they meet at the poles. These anomalies are to do with […]
