Anthropomorphizing mathematical concepts

(12:53:36) Paul: This program is offensive to the nature of natural numbers.

(12:56:29) Curtis: You’re assigning a value judgement to a mathematical concept, man!

(13:15:49) Paul: I’m a mathematician. I’m qualified to do that.

(13:16:42) Curtis: Well, so am I, so so am I! Twos hate people who assign value judgements to mathematical concepts.

(13:17:05) Paul: That’s okay. No one likes two.

(13:17:54) Curtis: Poor two. So angry all the time.

(13:18:02) Curtis: Just because it doesn’t work out nicely like 1 and 0 do.

(13:18:43) Paul: If it would keep in mind that it’s the first positive prime, it might be happier.

(13:18:58) Curtis: But the only even prime. You see, it’s a troublemaker.

(13:19:42) Paul: It’s also rather proud. You know, the whole even odd thing: That’s only a big deal at all because of two.

(13:20:22) Curtis: Right… but that’s just a lingual shortcut. No more significant than, say, %3==0, %3==1 and %3==2… we just don’t have terms as common as “even” and “odd” for those.

(13:21:34) Paul: Right. We don’t have lingual shortcuts for other integers.

(13:21:58) Paul: Two should be happy: It’s one of the tiny, tiny set of numbers called Integers.

(13:22:21) Curtis: Yeah, but it’s still one of infinity.

(13:22:38) Curtis: It’s not like it’s unique or even bounded that way or anything.

(13:29:56) Paul: *Shrugs* It’s an element of more useful sets than any other numbers than 0 and 1.

(13:30:18) Paul: And -1.

(13:30:25) Curtis: Well sure, but 0 and 1 are always outshining it. It’s always third. And that’s another problem – it doesn’t even get to be 2nd, even though it’s 2.

(14:05:25) Paul: It IS the 2nd positive integer.

(14:06:29) Curtis: You’re just trying to make 2 feel better. But remember, 2 hates people like us. So you’re just making it feel worse by being comforted by someone it hates.

(14:09:06) Paul: 2 is such a segregationist.

(14:09:25) Curtis: Everything is so black and white with 2.

(14:09:41) Curtis: There’s no room for compromise.

(14:10:38) Paul: Which is a shame, because if you consider 2’s roots, it was brought up with an irrational tendency toward the middle.

(14:10:43) Paul: Wow.

(14:10:52) Paul: I’m ashamed of typing that, I think.

(14:10:55) Curtis: That was awesome.


There are 10 types of people in this world: those who understand the binary system, and those who don’t.

Originally posted on LiveJournal