[squeak-dev] inverse hyperbolic function

Ken G. Brown kbrown at mac.com
Fri Apr 22 00:13:37 UTC 2011


At 1:48 AM +0200 4/22/11, Nicolas Cellier apparently wrote:
>2011/4/22 Ken G. Brown <kbrown at mac.com>:
>> At 12:58 AM +0200 4/22/11, Nicolas Cellier apparently wrote:
>>>2011/4/22 Ken G. Brown <kbrown at mac.com>:
>>><snip>
>>> >>>>
>>>>>>> "H" is much better than "h".
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> - Bert -
>>> >>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> -1
>>>>>> Not according to Wolfram. They suggest lower case 'h'.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Ken,
>>>>>> from my iPhone
>>>>>
>>>>> So what? Wolfram's use of "arc" for the hyperbolic inverse is wrong too, as Nicolas pointed out.
>>>>>
>>>>> - Bert -
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> So let's pretend Wolfram knows something about mathematical notation.
>>>>
>>>> Ken
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>Thinking of Wolfram as a God is Religion and there is nothing to
>>>debate in this case.
>>>But thinking of Wolfram as a human creation helps exercizing rational
>>>skeptical inquiry.
>>>
>>>Until someone exhibits a good rationale for employing arcus, it will be area.
>>>
>>>Nicolas
>>
>> No one is saying Wolfram is a God, I am just saying that he is an authority on mathematical programming.
>> Mathematica is very successful, and based on sound mathematical principles.
>> If you do not want to accept Wolfram as an authority, that's up to you I suppose.
>>
>
>If I can't disagree with an authority then it must be God.
>Maybe it will sound anarchist, but I recognize Mathematica as a
>reference, not as an authority.
>
>> I also see Maple uses arcsinh etc.
>>
>
>Oh yes, even Axiom, I'm very disappointed !
>
>> Mathematica and Maple are two of the main mathematical programs out there.
>> I see no real useful purpose in going against their standards.
>> And I think you will be hard pressed to find 'H' in the notation for inverse hyperbolic functions in math textbooks.
>>
>> Ken
>>
>
>Certainly, neither postfixed notation, x cosH, so at the end I'm not
>sure it matters that much.
>Look, Mathematica and Axiom don't agree on casing ArcSinh vs arcsinh,
>why would we have to ?
>
>Nicolas

My point of view is to try to make your mathematical functions look the way they are most commonly used in math.
I used Mathematica and Maple as two examples of mathematical programming systems.
Sure, you can symbolize them any way you want, but why not the way they are most commonly?

Ken





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