rational number

noun

Mathematics.

a number that can be expressed exactly by a ratio of two integers.

rational number

noun

any real number of the form a / b , where a and b are integers and b is not zero, as 7 or 7/3

rational number

A number that can be expressed as an integer or a quotient of integers. For example, 2, −5, and 1 2 are rational numbers.

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Word History and Origins

Origin of rational number¹

First recorded in 1900–05

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Example Sentences

Examples have not been reviewed.

And the box “�� Are Imaginary Numbers?” should have said that rational numbers include the integers, not that “rational numbers are the integers.”

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Even such bonkers-looking numbers, however, together with all the rational numbers, make up only a tiny fraction of the real numbers, or numbers that can appear along a number line.

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If the two new arrangements contained repeating patterns, the length of their translation vectors should have been related to each other—specifically, their ratio should have been a rational number.

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The conjecture predicts that the corresponding field will be “the smallest field that you get by taking sums, products and rational number multiples of these roots,” Arthur says.

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But Cantor’s hierarchy of infinities would tell a different tale: it would show just how little space the rational numbers take up on the number line.

From

rationally rational operation

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