"Hamish \(DP\) Harvey" <dh4180 at bristol.ac.uk> writes:
>> Aside from that, I thought this thread was really discussing equality
>> comparisons between Points and Numbers. And to my mind, a point is never
>> equal to a number of any kind, on account of not _being_ a number of any
>> kind (and I don't mean in the class heirarchy).

Um ... but aren't points (at least in 2-space) equivalent to complex
numbers?  So shouldn't they sort the same way?  (So, of course, now we
have to decide how complex numbers sort :-)  The way I like to think of
it is that numbers can be sorted by inserting them into an
(one-dimensional) array-like collection; points can be sorted by
inserting them into an appropriately dimensioned K-D tree (a quadtree in
the normal 2D case).
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"But in our ordinary lives we do not experience the world as a
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of car chases."  Janet H. Murray in "Hamlet on the Holodeck".
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