Talk:Principle of Mathematical Induction

I added this page and Second Principle of Mathematical Induction to the Proofs by Induction category. Seeing as they are the basis for the proofs in that category, I thought it made sense. However, I did not add Principle of Finite Induction or Second Principle of Finite Induction to this category. I don't know what other people think would make sense for these in terms of category assignments. --cynic 20:12, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I'd have no problems with Finite Induction going in there as well.

The "Mathematical Induction" ones are at a "higher level" than the "finite induction" ones (in the computer programming sense), in that they're more user friendly from the point of view of using them in proofs. The "finite induction" ones are there mainly because they need to be proved first before the "mathematical induction" ones can be validated. --Matt Westwood 20:56, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, done. --cynic 23:17, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Re-evaluating categories
We now have enough different induction principles that I would suggest a separate category of induction principles, perhaps as a subcategory of proof techniques. Perhaps this page could expand to index the second, third, whatever principle of induction, transfinite induction, well-ordered induction, well-founded induction, etc., etc.


 * Perhaps this page stays as it is, because there are lots of pages that link to this. Changing this one now will cause all sorts of stuff to break.


 * This page is standalone and needs no expansion. We don't do it like that on this website anyway. Before major grandiose structural architecture work, get to know how the rest of the site fits together, and that means: start small. Suggest you work on an area of mathematics you understand well (you seem to be seriously bogged down in class-theory axiomatics, some of the pages you've made repeated false starts on and don't seem to have a clue what your strategy is for whatever your goal is. etc. etc.), preferably an area for which you have a reliable text book (preferably more than one) that you understand. Otherwise the integrity of this site will suffer. --prime mover (talk) 00:44, 30 December 2012 (UTC)