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Why is infinity a valid mathematical concept?

Updated: 10/25/2022
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Thingadonta

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15y ago

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It turns out to be very useful.

For example, our intuition about counting numbers is that you can always add 1; there is no natural stopping place. This gives us the idea that there are infinitely many natural numbers. If we start thinking about the set of all natural numbers, that is an infinite set. The set of points on a line is another infinite set, and there is no natural way of cutting it down to a finite set.

If we think about summing series, often it is easier to think about summing all the terms of an infinite series, rather than stopping at some arbitrary point like the first million terms. Sometimes the infinite is simpler than the finite.

The infinite needs to be handled with care, and the rules weren't completely worked out until the early years of the 20th century. But infinite sets and infinite series have been used very successfully for a long time now.

Note: This answer relates to the concept of infinity in mathematics. The question as to whether the physical universe is infinite is a separate question. The evidence is that it is not. Again, in quantum physics there may be a smallest distance, so physical space may have "atoms", unlike the continuous space commonly used in mathematics.

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Q: Why is infinity a valid mathematical concept?
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