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How can one tell the difference when the result is undefined or math just doesn't know how to provide a value for that particular equation? (the value still exists however)

For example, how could one prove that by definition division by zero is undefined; it's not that math doesnt' know the value, the value just doesn't exist.

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    What does it mean for “math” to know a value? Anyway, you can’t prove something is undefined. For something to be undefined just means that we haven’t defined what it should be. In the case of division by zero, if we consider the set $\mathbb{R}$ of real numbers, there is no “natural” value in $\mathbb{R}$ that we could define $1/0$ to be. –  Jun 21 '12 at 21:16

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Whether something is defined or not is a matter of, well, definition. Division by zero is undefined because we explicitly exclude it from the definition of division. The reasons we exclude it from the definition are varied, of course, but it's not a matter of lack of knowledge.

It is not quite clear what you mean by "provide a value"; there are numbers which we can prove cannot be explicitly described in terms of a terminating algorithm (that is, there is no Turing Machine that will produce the number). But does that mean we do not provide a value?

We cannot write down exactly a number that solves the equation $x^2-2=0$. We cheat when we say the solutions are $\sqrt{2}$ and $-\sqrt{2}$ because... what does "$\sqrt{2}$" mean? It means "the positive real number that is a solution to $x^2-2=0$". Does that mean we "don't know how to provide a value"?

On the other hand, there are equations which we may genuinely not know whether they have solutions of a special kind or not. For a long time, it was unknown whether there were any positive integers $a$, $b$, and $c$, and a positive integer $n\gt 2$, such that $a^n+b^n=c^n$. Now we know there are none.

Arturo Magidin
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  • So when we say that something is undefined it simply means we didn't give it a name right? Like when we see a word like "eajsDsad" where we left it undefined because we don't want to give it a meaning right? – user599310 Aug 01 '20 at 22:51
  • @user599310: Not giving something a name is not the same thing as not defining it. Something may be defined but not have a specific name. We say something is undefined when it lacks a definition. – Arturo Magidin Aug 01 '20 at 23:28
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We don't "prove" that such statements are undefined, we "choose" not to define them, because we believe that in some contexts it doesn't make sense to do so. For instance, over the real numbers, we choose not to divide by zero because there is no explicit interest in doing so. But over the complex numbers, it makes great sense to say that $1/0 = \infty$, and in some contexts it is very important to understand what it means.

For instance, over real numbers, if we would try to define $1/0$ by continuity, we would suggest $1/0 = \lim_{x \to 0} \frac 1x$, but this limit doesn't exist. However, if we take the same definition over $\overline{\mathbb C}$, it works! The limit exists and is worth $\infty$ in the compactification of the complex plane. We don't prove that something is undefined, we just don't define it when we don't want to. That's the big idea.

Hope that helps,

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In the real numbers we can prove that division by zero is not only undefined but cannot be defined at all. Why? Because we would like the real numbers to have certain properties which are not consistent with the idea of division by zero.

We do can prove the "undefinability" by showing that if division by zero were possible to define we could derive a contradiction (e.g. $1=2$), and contradictions are bad. So we avoid things which prove contradictions.

To see that indeed this is the case suppose that $\frac10$ was defined, then $0\times\frac10=0$ since everything times zero is zero; on the other hand $\frac10\times0=1$ because we multiply a number by its inverse. Therefore $0=1$... contradiction!


On the other hand, we can prove that a continuous function $f$ which satisfies: $$\lim_{x\to\infty} f(x)=\infty,\text{ and }\lim_{x\to-\infty}f(x)=-\infty$$ Has at least one root, that is there exists some $c\in\mathbb R$ such that $f(c)=0$. Even though we don't know what $f$ is or how to find this $c$.

Why can we prove that? If we assume that this is not the case then we can once again derive contradiction in one form or another.

Asaf Karagila
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  • All the maths can be derived from ZFC and we use definitions as abbrevations. So is in our hands what we can "define" and what we can't? – user599310 Aug 01 '20 at 22:40
  • Yes. You can define anything. The question is whether or not you've gone out of your way to include a special case, in a way that completely interferes with the natural structure of ideas and statements. You can do that, but the rest of us are perfectly content with not doing that. – Asaf Karagila Aug 02 '20 at 00:39
  • For example why we can't define the multiplication of a 3x3 matrix with a 4x4 matrix? – user599310 Aug 02 '20 at 15:24
  • This has to do with the properties you want this multiplication to have. As I said, you are free to define anything you'd like, but the onus is on you to show that it fits into the rest of the framework that is modern mathematics. – Asaf Karagila Aug 02 '20 at 15:29
  • If definition is subjective then how a definition "respects" the axioms of a system? – user599310 Aug 02 '20 at 15:40
  • Just because some things are ambiguous doesn't mean there are no restrictions on compatibility. – Asaf Karagila Aug 02 '20 at 15:50