10858 | By adding an axis of imaginary numbers, we get the useful 'number plane' instead of number line [Clegg] |
Full Idea: The realisation that brought 'i' into the toolkit of physicists and engineers was that you could extend the 'number line' into a new dimension, with an imaginary number axis at right angles to it. ...We now have a 'number plane'. | |
From: Brian Clegg (Infinity: Quest to Think the Unthinkable [2003], Ch.12) |