This is no longer a problem for you now, but it has gone through a long time in the process of human understanding.

Judging from the history of mathematics development, China is in a leading position in the world in the use of negative numbers and their operations-about 2000 years ago, he had already known negative numbers, stipulated the expression method of negative numbers, pointed out the practical significance of negative numbers, and further applied the operation of positive and negative numbers to solving equations.

Abroad, India began to recognize negative numbers around the 7th century. In Europe, negative numbers did not appear until 12 and 3 centuries, but they were not welcomed by western mathematicians at that time, and even many people said that negative numbers were not numbers.

New discoveries in science are often resisted by conservative forces. When the concept of negative numbers was introduced to Europe, there was a fierce conflict between old and new ideas. This great debate lasted for hundreds of years, and finally a relatively consistent view was reached: negative numbers are numbers like positive numbers and zero.

There is an episode in this big debate that can arouse people's deep thinking:

One day, Pascal, a famous educator and physicist (1623 ~ 1662), was chatting with Arnold, a good friend and theologian (16 12 ~ 1694).

Now, it has appeared.

(- 1)∶ 1= 1∶(- 1)

This strange phenomenon of "small number: large number = large number: small number" is over!

Arnault's words certainly aroused people's strong interest, and even some people questioned that if you admit that negative numbers are numbers, you have to admit the strange phenomenon of "decimal: large number = large number: decimal".

Actually, this is a normal phenomenon. When the range of numbers is expanded, some of the original mathematical phenomena are retained, while others are not. The range of numbers has expanded from positive integers and fractions to rational numbers, and the mathematical phenomenon that "the ratio of large numbers to decimals must be equal to the ratio of large numbers to decimals" will no longer be retained. This will happen again when you learn more mathematics knowledge and the range of numbers is further expanded.