Think Infinite and not the finite

[ElectroPhysics]

Why every one is so afraid from the term infinity?

 

[El Hombre Invisible]

Because it has three eyes?

 

[arildno]

Naah, it is scaly and green and lives in a swamp.
Besides, it slurps a lot.

 

[russ_watters]

I'm not a big fan of the cars and their commercials really get on my nerves.

 

[franznietzsche]

I'm not a big fan of the cars and their commercials really get on my nerves.

Not as bad as the Sport Ka commercial where the car cut the head off a cat with the sun roof.

 

[moose]

I'm not a big fan of the cars and their commercials really get on my nerves.

The car is infiniti not infinity

I wouldn't mind owning a G35 though

 

[fourier jr]

Why every one is so afraid from the term infinity?

because they don't understand it. math people are used to it though so they aren't afraid.

"in math you don't understand things, you just get used to them." -- john von neumann

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Only a few cardinalities cause me concern. The cardinality of the set of all cardinalities bothers me a lot.

 

[Hurkyl]

For good reason, I think. I'd imagine the class of cardinal numbers can't "fit" into a set.

(I know this is a paradox when dealing with the ordinal numbers -- it's even named after someone! The class of cardinal numbers is less well-behaved, I can't be sure it's a paradox for there to be a set of cardinal numbers)

 

[Ivan Seeking]

For good reason, I think. I'd imagine the class of cardinal numbers can't "fit" into a set.

(I know this is a paradox when dealing with the ordinal numbers -- it's even named after someone! The class of cardinal numbers is less well-behaved, I can't be sure it's a paradox for there to be a set of cardinal numbers)

It's even worse than I thought!

I'm afraid.

 

[brewnog]

I reckon the "fear of infinity" is a pretty natural thing, for humans. Most of us live in a world where the size of elementary particlesis incomprehensibly small, and the speed of light is incomprehensibly large.

Even when we can quantitise these factors in terms of things which are familiar to us, their respective orders are so small/big that they can get the better of us sometimes.

 

[Hurkyl]

If you're talking about a sense of scale, it's pretty clear that people generally lack that even in more "human" cases. For example, if something has a one in a million chance of happing each day, how many people do you think would agree that it happens once a day in Detroit? (On average)

I've heard it stated that one of mankind's greatest inadequacies is that we don't fathom just how fast the exponential function grows.

 

[Moonbear]

Honestly, this is the first time I've ever heard of such a fear. What's to fear? It's just a fallen 8.

 

[brewnog]

It's just a fallen 8.

So sheltered, so deluded, yet so content...

 

[Ivan Seeking]

So sheltered, so deluded, yet so content...

No kidding, like anyone's afraid of aleph-0.

Risk benefit analysis agrees that it makes sense to buy one lottery ticket now and again. Proof of Hurkyl's point is found every time that someone buys more than one ticket.

Oh yes, for anyone who remembers, it seems that my cousin really didn't win the lottery twice. Instead, grandma's [not my grandma] bank account was raided twice. I should have guessed when they claimed to win a second time! About $100K all totalled I think. Grandma is in a home, you see.