17 Feb
2007
17 Feb
'07
7:04 a.m.
On 2/17/07, Emma Cohen <emma@don-eve.dyndns.org> wrote:
But this reminds me of something that used to bother me in high school when I learned about conic sections: Was anyone else annoyed that a line segment (which can be defined as the set of all points X such that |AX| + |BX| = |AB| and hence seems to be a sort of ellipse under one common definition) is not in fact a conic section?
Isn't this definition of a line segment just an ellipse whose minor axis is zero?
However, if you attempt to construct a finite line segment as the intersection of a plane with a cone --- the origin of the term "conic section" --- you will find it impossible, WFL