0.9 recurring equal to 1?

[zissou'smom]

I was thinking about this thread... you know what's weird? I think every academic field has its own arguments like this. I've heard equally heated arguments over the serial comma (the serial comma being this: red, white, and blue versus red, white and blue) and the like.

I'll just take your word for it that .99999... is equal to one. And y'all can take mine that serial commas are a matter of personal preference.

 

[icklemiss21]

Serial commas are a pet peeve of mine, I once had a prof who refused to mark my paper because of my 'bad grammar'. I hadn't had any other complaints so took a copy of the paper to the head of department and seemingly, it was an ongoing argument with this prof as he gets really upset if you do not use that extra comma.

 

[kaleetha]

The serial comma is one the FH and I argue about all the time.

In journalism, we were taught not to use the comma if it's a simple series, but do if it's a compound series....

So: The flag was red, white and blue.
versus: The flag had a blue field, red stripes, and white stars.

But in Technical writing (what fh learned), they use the serial comma no matter what. So when I was writing papers and news articles, fh and I used to argue a little. (I used to have him proofread.)

Okay... hijack over.