Jorge Luis Borges discussion

I think Borges was using the blue tigers as a metaphor for infinite series, like Taylor series. If you treat them naively, you can make them sum up to anything you want:

3 = 3 + 0 + 0 + 0 + ....
= 3 + (1 - 1) + (1 - 1) + (1 - 1) + ...
= 3 + 1 + (-1 + 1) + (-1 + 1) + ...
= 4 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 0
= 4

I wrote a few paragraphs on a quantum particle I call "lazulinos", in response to the story:
http://reperiendi.wordpress.com/2010/...

Pretty interesting. Thanks for the link. I have a question in relation to Aleph which I will via a message in a while since it's a bit personal. (Oh! No, I haven't yet located the Aleph)

It is important to note that 'treating them naively' is the key here. Those equals signs aren't normal equals signs. 'Intuitive' equals signs are only intuitive, not true.

I think Borges is referring to something much more mentally horrifying: what if arithmetic itself breaks down? It is one thing to not know if something is true or false, and another to find out that something you've held to be true actually isn't, but what if something that you literally can not disbelieve (like 1+1=2) is suddenly false? How would this destroy your ability to reason, or to believe anything?

Ahimaaz wrote: "Pretty interesting. Thanks for the link. I have a question in relation to Aleph which I will via a message in a while since it's a bit personal. (Oh! No, I haven't yet located the Aleph)"
Easy to located the Aleph: is here,there, and everywhere.