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I am told that the statement, "Triangle XYZ is similar to triangle RST", is a mathematical statement.

A mathematical statement is a statement that is either true or false.

My thoughts were that this cannot be a mathematical statement, since the language used is imprecise and ambiguous. In saying that something is 'similar' to something else is subjective, and cannot be considered to be definitively true or false.

However, my textbook says that it is a mathematical statement. Why is my reasoning incorrect? How should I reason about this?

Thank you.

Rob Arthan
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The Pointer
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"Similar," in this case, is a technical mathematical term. (And if you think that's bad, so is "mouse".)

Noah Schweber
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    +1) And then you also have a what's called "premouse". LOL – imranfat Nov 24 '16 at 05:54
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    I'm going to ring my social group and see if any of them work in this field :) – David Nov 24 '16 at 05:59
  • Hopefully the verminous mice and premice will be expunged by the furry friends of humanity that are the objects of the category of categories ($\mathbf{cat}$) $\ddot{\smile}$. – Rob Arthan Nov 24 '16 at 23:46
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    @RobArthan I think my favorite category name is the category of Banach Analytic Manifolds . . . BanAnaMan! – Noah Schweber Nov 25 '16 at 00:30