On Numbers

[Tom Anderson]

On Sun, 15 Jan 2006, Alex Martelli wrote:

> Paul Rubin <http://phr.cx@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
>
>> Mike Meyer <mwm at mired.org> writes:
>>
>>> I'd like to work on that. The idea would be that all the numeric types 
>>> are representations of reals with different properties that make them 
>>> appropriate for different uses.
>>
>> 2+3j?
>
> Good point, so s/reals/complex numbers/ -- except for this "detail", 
> Mike's idea do seem well founded.

1 ** 0.5 ?

I do like the mathematical cleanliness of making ints and floats do the 
right thing when the answer would be complex, but as a pragmatic decision, 
it might not be the right thing to do. It evidently wasn't thought it was 
when python's current number system was designed. I think Tim Peters has 
an opinion on this.

tom

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