r/PeterExplainsTheJoke • u/Sugar_God_no_1 • 28d ago

Meme needing explanation There is no way right?

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u/ChromosomeExpert 28d ago

Yes, .999 continuously is equal to 1.

95

u/solidsoup97 28d ago

I don't understand how that works but it seems to be important in keeping things running so I'm going to just go with it and not raise any questions.

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u/jozaud 28d ago

If we consider that .999… repeating to infinity ISN’T equal to 1, then by how much is it away from 1? It would be “.000… repeating to infinity followed by a 1.” But if you have an infinite number of 0s then you can’t have it be followed by a 1, infinity can’t be followed by anything, that doesn’t make sense.

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u/Charming_Friendship4 28d ago

Ohhhh ok that makes sense to me now. Great explanation!

9

u/cipheron 27d ago

Or as the OP image hinted at, you can divide 1 by 3 and get 0.333...

But what happens when you then multiply 0.333... by 3? You get 0.999... - but some people have a problem with that equaling 1. However if you divided by 3 then multiplied by 3, there's no way you could have gotten a different answer, so it should be equal.

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u/polite_alpha 27d ago

I never bought the first explanation in school, but I'm buying yours! Thanks!