If Numbers Could Talk

When One came home from school and entered the house, his parents Four and Seven were waiting for him. His father, Seven, looked at him sternly. “What’s the matter?” said One. “What did we tell you about hanging out with negative numbers?” his father asked. One looked down sheepishly. “We were just hanging out after school for a little while. What’s the big deal? They are just like us.” “Just like us!” the father roared back. “There are no such things as negative numbers. Everyone knows you start counting at one. You should be proud that your number comes first. Now these numbers claim they come before you. Have you ever started counting with a negative number? Have you ever seen a negative distance or measured a negative time? No! Distance has to be positive and time always flows forward. The nerve of these negatives to claim to be real numbers like us. Why, in my day we never even heard of them. But there they go, moving into our neighborhood, brazenly carrying their minus signs in front of them like it’s a badge of honor. Do You know what happens if you get added to a negative One? You get annihilated and become zero. Poof. You stop existing as a number.” And don’t even get me started on those numbers claiming to be irrational. Stick to your own kind. Nice whole numbers like us. We didn’t raise you this way.” “I’m sorry,” One said with a sad look on his face. “I’ll be more careful from now on.” “I hope so,” replied his mother. “Your father and I are trying to protect you. We are all nice straight-line numbers, nice and angular. That’s why we moved here. None of the round numbers live here. Let the Twos, Threes, Fives, Eights, and Nines stick to their neighborhoods. It was all fine for a while until those negatives came in thinking they are like us if they have straight lines, like we don’t see their minus signs in front of them.

I have to go out for drink now, Seven said to his wife as he headed outside to the part of town where the bars were clustered. He passed the first bar he saw called “The Number One Bar” since he didn’t know if it referred to their rating or the type of patrons they attracted. The next one down was called “Your Number’s Up Inn.” He liked the name, but he liked even better what was written below. It said “This is a straight bar.” Then below that were the words that were music to his ears: “If you’re round, turn around!” Seven sidled up to the bar and asked for a scotch on the rocks. As the bartender poured the drink, Seven bemoaned the fact that zeros were ever allowed number status. “It’s crazy,” he said. “Zero is not a number! It’s the absence of one. If you have zero of something, you don’t have it. So, there is nothing to count. “Yeah, I get you,” said the bartender. “Such nonsense. They say you have to tolerate them because they are useful as placeholders. Since when are numbers to be used for placeholders? That’s not for us. Of course, they are perfectly rounded geometric shapes. Nothing even remotely straight on them like Nines. None of those zeroes will ever be allowed in this bar. Not as long as I have something to say about it.”

Seven looked like he still wanted to talk and the bar wasn’t busy, so the bartender leaned in and continued. “You want to know what is really crazy? Now I hear there are imaginary numbers”. “What? What in the world is an imaginary number?” Seven responded. The bartender continued, “I hear they are the square root of negative one.” “But there is no number when multiplied by itself will give a negative number, even if there were such a thing as a negative number,” Seven shot back with more than a trace of anger in his voice. “What do these so-called imaginary numbers even look like?” “I hear they look like the letter i,” the bartender answered. That’s the small letter with the round dot on top. Not the capital.” Seven spit out his drink in anger. “There are letters going around acting like numbers?” They are the opposite of numbers. They are not quantitative at all, not even ordinal. I got to go,”, he said as he threw some money on the table. Sure enough, just as Seven left the Inn and turned the corner he saw an “i” walking toward him. When they got close, Seven shouted at him, “Hey you with that dot on your head. We don’t like your kind in our neighborhood. Why don’t you go back to the letters you came from?” The “i” stopped and looked him over. “I’ll have you know I’m just as much a number as you. In fact, I can solve equations and provide solutions to practical problems.” Seven smacked him so hard, his dot flew off and bounced down the street. “You look a lot better without that dot on your head. You can almost pass for a One, a real number.” “You idiot,” replied the “i”. “The dot is part of my head. If you don’t put it back now, I will die.” Seven hit him so hard that the top of his body bent over like a “7” shape and collapsed to the floor. “At least he died as a respectable number,” Seven thought as he attempted to drag the erstwhile “i” home for a planned burial.

As Seven turned the corner to the block where his home was located, two police officers stood in his path; a One and a Four. “You better get that Seven to a hospital quick,” the One said. “We’ll take him in our squad car.” The officer attempted to pick the victim up, and then quickly put him down again. “Wait a minute,” he said. “This is not a Seven. It’s way too short and its head is misshapen and not perpendicular to its body. Did you mutilate another number to make it look like a Seven?” Seven hesitated before realizing the officer couldn’t be fooled. “Yes,” he said. I came across this so-called “imaginary number” and had to straighten him out. It doesn’t belong here. It should have stuck with its own kind. Surely as a proud One, you must recognize that.” The officer took out his Seven cuffs and wrapped it around the perpetrator's neck, just below the perpendicular line. “I’m arresting you for numbercide," he said. "You can’t do that,” replied Seven. “I did not kill a real number. You can’t kill something that only exists in your imagination.” “Nevertheless,” replied the officer, “mathematicians tell us they need them. You can’t go around killing off something they need to do their work. Their work benefits all of us.” “It’s funny, they used to only need us to do their work. Mathematicians think they invented us. They did not! They discovered us. We always existed in some Platonic realm for an eternity. We would exist even if there was no universe. All of us and our theorems were always out there waiting to be discovered. Now some mathematicians invent something and think this invention is just like us? Even worse, they think they can just assign a letter to represent them, and poof, we just have to accept the letter as one of us. Hell no!” Seven screamed as he was ushered into the squad car. “It’s not for us to decide that. Mathematicians will do what works best for the world. Just accept that. The world is changing and we better change with it if we all want to get along,” Officer One replied and he got behind the wheel of the squad car, Officer Four getting in the passenger seat alongside him.

Seven spent the night in a jail cell. The next morning, he was arraigned before a judge.

Judge: According to the sworn testimony of Officer One, you did admit to killing and mutilating an imaginary number last night. Is that correct?

Seven: Yes, that is correct.

Judge: Can you tell me the circumstances under which that happened?

Seven: The circumstances? I was walking home from a straight bar and told this line and a dot that he shouldn’t be in this neighborhood. Then he starts spouting off about how useful he is, like he has the same right to exist that I do. Except I really existed long before anything else did, and he is just the figment of someone’s imagination.

Judge: You are aware of the theory that all of us were invented, and therefore the invention of imaginary numbers is no different than the invention of natural numbers?

Seven: I don’t believe that theory. We were here long before the universe was created and we will be long after it’s gone. Tell me something. If imaginary numbers are so sacred, why do we not have imaginary judges? Why don’t convicted numbers get sentenced to an imaginary number of years in jail? Answer me that!

Judge: I’m not here to respond to your theories, but to enforce the law. Since you admitted to the crime, you are hereby remanded to jail until the trial judge pronounces the sentence. Given the fact that you are unrepentant, the maximum sentence is likely to be imposed. Do you know the maximum penalty is for numbercide?

Seven: That's what you call it. I say an it’s not a real numbercide, only an imaginary one.

Judge: The sentence is that you will be added to your negative counterpart and be annihilated to nothing. If I were you, I would reflect on that and beg for forgiveness.

Seven: And if I were you, I would reflect on why I would destroy a fellow natural number and do the mathematician’s bidding.

The judge pounded his gavel, and court officers hustled Seven off to the cell.