Abstract: |
For those of you who think that the set of real numbers is
blissfully smooth and hole-less unlike the rational
numbers, here is some food for thought: we construct an
extension of the reals with its main structural
characteristics (totally ordered, field, etc.) but where
there are numbers that are both positive and less than 1/n
for every n. A redemption of seventeenth century calculus,
Abraham Robinson's nonstandard real numbers fill up the
reals as the pizza will fill up your stomachs.
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