🚀 go-pugleaf

Christian Froeschlin (froesccn@cip.mathematik.uni-stuttgart.de) wrote:
: As a math student I have to protest ;-) A physics book is probably not the
: right place to look up such concepts. A scalar IS a vector (in a one-
: dimensional vector space). It's just a matter of view-point. The vector
: definition with direction you're refering to is just a useful special
: case. Q.e.d.

Finally someone talking some sense. I don't know why so many people seem to
want to use a physics book to find a mathematics definition. All this talk
about directions and magnitudes is just a physics simplification of a more
general mathematical definition. The fact is a vector is a member of a vector
space. All sorts of things qualify as vector spaces (I'm not giving examples
unless asked - I can't remeber any good ones off hand). 

This started when someone said a vector is not a point. A vector is usually
given as 3 values that represent distances along the three axis. A point is 3
values that represent distances along the three axis from the origin. Points
can usually treated as vectors and vice versa, but they are not the same. When
talking about vectors in 3d space any vector can be interpreted as a point
(properly known as a position vector) by positioning the vector at the origin
(as has already been pointed out).

-- 

 Steve Hodge
 sbh@cs.waikato.ac.nz
 Computer Science Dept, University of Waikato,
 Hamilton, New Zealand