Talk:Number line

The purpose of the number line is to organize the information about the quantitative value of number notation. In order to do that you have to start with a straight line and a point on the line called the zero point. Then you (usually move to the right) a distance and mark off a second point which you call a unit distance mark and label it with the number 1. Now you can create the integer number line by continuing to mark off additional unit distances and name them with the numbers 2, 3, etc and you have created an agreed on ordered number line, with the number of unit distances from the point zero being the agreed on numerical value of the number. Then, with the assistence of the Pythagorean Theorum and other mathematical ideas, you can create other than integer distances and move them to points on the number line and give them a name and a numerical value which is proportional to their distance along the number line. And thus you have an organized and ordered system of naming and snowing the relative size (length) of the various numerical notations.WFPM (talk) 15:32, 12 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Now the number line will work for any base system of numbering that you might like to consider. And we usually consider the base 10 numbering system in talking about numbering considerations. What the number line does is define the value of each number in any base system as the relative size of that value versus the 0 to 1 distance. That is called ordering the set of the numbers. There are many other numerical base systems for measurement, and the simplest and probably the best, is the "binomial" or base 2 numbering system, which only has the two digits 0 (zero) and 1 (one) for number value notation.WFPM (talk) 16:54, 5 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Reference literature[change source]

Please Explain by Isaac Asimov Dell Publishing Co. 1965 Science, Numbers and I by Isaac Asimov Mercury Press 1966 Adding a Dimension by Isaac Asimov Lancer Books 1969 Asimov on Numbers by Isaac Asimov Pocket Books 1978WFPM (talk) 17:45, 5 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]