Audio Banter - View Single Post - Super discussion about negative numbers on the BBC

**Eiron** · March 11th 06, 08:08 AM posted to rec.audio.tubes,uk.rec.audio

wrote:

Definition of i snipped

I cannot reproduce a diagram. But what you get is four points on a
graph. Set your knives to those points, and you can cut a straight cut
on moving stock. Add other calculations, and you can graph other cuts
to minimize waste. Remember, this was pre-desk-top-computer... well
over 30 years ago and I was NOT the one making the calculations. The
above are unashamedly cribbed from a website that also cribbed from
another website... but also is dedicated to topology. Items like the
Klein Bottle and the Mobius strip can be described mathematically. As I
remember, both also use ' i ' as there are 'imaginary' conditions to be
described as points in space or points on a plain.

As I said, I know all about complex numbers but don't see how they help
in calculating your cardboard boxes; and neither, apparently, do you.

You seem to be suggesting above that a position in 2-dimensional space
can be described by x,y coordinates but we all knew that anyway.

Where's the example showing that use of a rectangle of negative area and
imaginary sides helps in your calculations? It sounds fascinating and
many of us are waiting with bated breath.

--
Eiron

There's something scary about stupidity made coherent - Tom Stoppard.