🚀 go-pugleaf

I'll never forget the time that Jeremy Boden <jeremy@jboden.demon.co.uk>
said:

>In article <370CE0C2.6CBA40D3@flash.net>, Matt McLelland
><mattpi@flash.net> writes
>>Siobhan Michaels wrote:
>...
>>> Also, i can't grasp the topic of surds and could anyone help me with that??
>>I don't know what a surd is.
>
>A root as in square root, cube root etc. You must be more specific.

Even though that is what it means, the only context in which I've ever
heard it used in conversation was specifically finding the square root of
irrational binomial numbers like 22 + 12u, where u is the square root of 2
or complex numbers.  As someone pointed out, there is always a solution
(if the two numbers are rational) and you can find it by assuming that the
number is of the form A+Bu where A and B are rational numbers, squaring
that figure, and then creating a system of equations by equating the
rational parts and the parts that are the rational multiple of u.

-Matthew
---
Matthew Daly  mwdaly@pobox.com  http://www.frontiernet.net/~mwdaly/

Though he is a person to whom things do not happen, perhaps they 
may when he is on the other side.  - E. Gorey