• Lvxferre@lemmy.ml
    8·
    10 months ago

    That’s surprisingly accurate, as people here are highlighting (it makes geometrical sense when dealing with complex numbers).

    My nephew once asked me this question. The way that I explained it was like this:

    • the friend of my friend is my friend; (+1)*(+1) = (+1)
    • the enemy of my friend is my enemy; (+1)*(-1) = (-1)
    • the friend of my enemy is my enemy; (-1)*(+1) = (-1)
    • the enemy of my enemy is my friend; (-1)*(-1) = (+1)

    It’s a different analogy but it makes intuitive sense, even for kids. And it works nice as mnemonic too.

      • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
        1·
        10 months ago

        Fun fact: exponents and multiplication DO work like rotation … in the complex domain (numbers with their imaginary component). It’s not a pure rotation unless it’s scalar, but it’s neat.

        I know I explained that the worst ever, but 3blue1brown on YT talks about it and many other advanced math concepts in a lovely intuitive way.