NaN comparisons - Call For Anecdotes

[Ian Kelly]

On Thu, Jul 17, 2014 at 5:00 PM, Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 17, 2014 at 3:08 PM, Marko Rauhamaa <marko at pacujo.net> wrote:
>> Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly at gmail.com>:
>>
>>> Well, 0**0 is usually defined as 1, despite the limits being
>>> ambiguous.
>>
>> <URL: https://www.math.hmc.edu/funfacts/ffiles/10005.3-5.shtml>
>>
>>     But if it could be defined, what "should" it be? 0 or 1?
>
> I did say "usually". There's not one single Holy Keeper of the
> Definitions for mathematics. Wikipedia lists some differing opinions
> on the subject:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exponentiation#Zero_to_the_power_of_zero
>
> I note that mathworld.wolfram.com also lists it as undefined, though.

Incidentally, as noted in the Wikipedia article you left out some
options -- it's not just between 0 or 1. It's also possible to derive
a limit of positive infinity or any nonnegative real.