John-Paul Flintoffhttps://pluralistic.net/2026/03/19/jargon-watch/
“language isn't math (which is why double negatives are intensifiers, not negators)”
Phosphenes@johnpaulflintoff @pluralistic
I once tried to work out a 'Spanish negatives' multiplication system, where EG:
-2 * -3 = -6
so square_root(-9) = -3 and so on.
It's all fun and games until you multiply negatives times positives and try to come out with symmetrical answers.
But it does make one wonder if our language had been different, maybe our math would have been too.
Patrys@Phosphenes @johnpaulflintoff @pluralistic
It’s a fun exercise because it forced me to think how to show this without resorting to flashy terms like “algebraic rings”.
In your algebra, some of the following axioms have to be false:
-x = 0 - x
x * y = y * x
x * (a - b) = x*a - x*b
Because if all are true:
-x * -y = (0 - x) * (0 - y) = (0 - x) * 0 - (0 - x) * y = 0 - (0 - x) * y = 0 - y * (0 - x) = 0 - (y * 0 - y * x) = 0 - 0 + y * x = y * x = x * y