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God created the real numbers

(www.ethanheilman.com)
136 points Bogdanp | 2 comments | 29 Aug 25 15:31 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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athrowaway3z ◴[29 Aug 25 19:19 UTC] No.45068256[source]▶
Can't say that I'm completely in the headspace to follow the argument, but wanted to add my 2 cents from a few years ago.

Integers come into existence long before god - as the only presumption required is a difference between one thing and another (or nothing). The integers also create infinite gaps. The primes.

So no - I do not think reals are closer to the divine. They require we import infinity twice to be defined, and I'm undecided on whether our reality has unbounded 'precision' like that - or if 'just' an infinite number of discrete units.

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1. foobarian ◴[29 Aug 25 20:09 UTC] No.45068824[source]▶
I find primes spooky. They seem to be a concept that exists regardless of reality or universe. How does such a incontrovertible structure arise?

ps. Various numerology phenomena have a similar vibe, and no wonder so many people who go off the deep end tend to get trapped by them. Maybe I will be one of them as I become old and senile :-D

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2. ysofunny ◴[29 Aug 25 22:44 UTC] No.45070250[source]▶
> How does such a incontrovertible structure arise?

yes, I also enjoy trying to answer this question.

what is such an structure even mean? how could it be that simply defining numbers, obersving addition, and generalizing it away into multiplication would yield this natural structure?

It all begins with zero. the predecessor of One, the best known number.

zero can be assumed by anyone. the surprise is how all zeros are the same zero. (by uniqueness of emptyset; but as I hope you can see, I'm a crank. a nutjob. I'll stop