🚀 go-pugleaf

>On Thu, 27 Mar 1997 14:03:44 GMT, jjunging@sciborg.uwaterloo.ca
>(Yohaun) wrote:

>>On a note related to what you mentioned above, I read an article in
>>Scientific American/Nature/(?) last year or so that discussed Surreal
>>Numbers. If my recollection is correct, it is a fairly new arithmetic
>>system that allows you to do math "at infinity". The surreal numbers
>>allow many paradoxes (such as Zeno's) to be resolved. I recall a quote in
>>that article which stayed with me: "Often in physics we get ridiculously
>>infinite answers to perfectly reasonable questions." Yup. Been there, done
>>it, and it always hurts my head...

Not fairly new -- a least a couple decades old.

I'm not sure that surreal numbers are the way to go here.  There is
another part of mathematics called non-standard analysis where
infinitesimals show up, though not very easy to understand for the
layperson -- not just a dx here and a dy there, but messes involving
infinite sequences and goodies called filters and ultrafilters. 

Theron