Talk:Indefinite and fictitious numbers

17
Shouldn’t 17 be here? An Alonzo Church PhD advisee taught me that 17 is the standard random number used by mathematicians. Encyclopedant (talk) 05:56, 29 May 2023 (UTC)


 * That would be awesome but some sort of sourcing other than a second-hand remembered comment is needed. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 15:05, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

oodle?
we need to expound *illions and incorporate oodles... which is similiar and more. Tymes (talk) 19:51, 13 October 2023 (UTC)

French: proposed changes and input
I suggest the following :

- 36 and 36 000 to be marked as often meaning "very many", "too many", an indefinite number too large for reasonable consideration ("il n'y a pas 36 solutions", meaning "there aren't many ways to do this", implying there is just one)

- Add "trente-douze" and "quarante-douze" as examples of hunourous constructs meaning "uselessly large number"

- Add "n-ième" (pronounced 'ennième') as meaning "yet another of many repetitions (umpteenth)" This one maybe added under the Umpteen section instead. Philippe Magnabosco (talk) 10:08, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Adding material about Typological numbers
I thought of writing a wikipedia article about the scholarly concept of "Typological number". I started collecting references for it, and now I discovered this existing article. The concept of "Typological number" has a large overlap with what this article discusses so I think the best thing would be to do gradually and carefully combine my materials into this article.

If you didn't hear about typological numbers here is my understanding of the concept, and some of the materials I collected:

Typological number, aka formulaic number, typical number or archetypal number is a number that appears in a written text or spoken language, seemingly to literally quantify things (e.g. periods of time, age, number of people, sums of money, theoretical categories) but in fact should not necessarily be understood literally, but rather as a symbol, a metaphor (or more precisely a metonymy), hyperbole, or as a part of an idiom or a literary pattern. The name symbolic number is often also used in this context, but this expression also has other and broader meanings. Typological numbers appear mostly in religious and fictional literary writings, but also in day-to-day speech and idioms, and are even claimed to sometimes appear in presumably factual historic narratives and theoretical analyses.

It is suggested that in several divisions to 5 categories found in medieval Arabic grammatical literature the number 5 is typological (due to the symbolic importance of this number in Islam) and that these divisions to 5 are not theoretically justified in themselves and cause discrepancies.

Muslim medieval historians claim that Muhamad found 70000 ounces of gold in the Kaaba, that in the 9th century there were 7000 mosques in Basra, or that 700000 Byzantine soldiers were taken prisoners when the Arabs captured Caesarea Maritima, and other such examples.

The number 13 is repeated with great frequency in Tibetan and Mongolian mythology and ancient history. For example, all the early kings of Tibet, are claimed to have began to reign at the age of 13, or else reigned for 13 years. In very early historical times Tibet was divided into 13 districts, and also when it was re-divided under Mongol rule. And many other such examples.

In the Old Testament the expression "40 years" is very common. For example, the Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years, King David and King Solomon ruled for 40 years each, Isaac and Esau were married at the age of 40, and other such examples.

Your thoughts? Vegan416 (talk) 13:03, 27 March 2024 (UTC)


 * It seems to fit perfectly into the "indefinite" section, although you could tighten the descriptions considerably. The only concern is that the section is becoming so large that it may need to be spun off into its own article. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 15:29, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @DavidWBrooks
 * Ok. I'll start within this article, and if needed refer the section about "typological numbers" here into a main article about "typological numbers" the way it's often done in wikipedia. I suppose that's what you mean. Part of the issue is that although the concept of "typological number" is used extensively in research, it is not very well defined, so it might be difficult to divide into two different articles. I can suggest the distinction that what you wrote about in this article so far tends more to the comical, everyday or explicitly exaggerated, whereas  "typological number" refers to examples of a more serious or symbolic/mystical nature. But this  distinction is not so clear cut. Vegan416 (talk) 17:41, 27 March 2024 (UTC)