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Comic #470

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For the non-mathematics geeks amongst you, an abelian group is a particular type of algebraic structure - being a set of objects with a binary operation defined on it such that:

This is essentially a fancy way of saying "the integers, and addition" considered as a whole thing. There are other sorts of groups, some of which are not abelian, and some of which are, but they're not important for this comic. Maybe another time.

Anyway, if you take an abelian group and define a second binary operation on the elements of the set such that:

then you produce what is known in mathematics terminology as a ring. Note that the second operation in a ring does not necessarily have to have inverse elements or be commutative.

This is essentially a fancy way of saying "the integers, and addition, and multiplication". Again, there are other examples, but they're not important right now.

So, if you know how to add and multiply integers, next time a mathematician asks you if you know anything about group theory and ring theory, you can say, "Why, yes!"


And for the non-Tolkien geeks amongst you, the One Ring is the fabled Ring of Power forged by the Dark Lord Sauron in the Second Age of Middle-earth, with the power to...

Oh sod it. Like anyone reading this far hasn't read the books or at least seen the movies by now.

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