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    • Object less than any measurable size

      • An infinitesimal object is an object less than any measurable size, but not so small or small that the available means cannot distinguish it from zero. Therefore, "infinitesimal" means "infinitesimally small" or less than any standard number of the real number when used as a mathematical adjective.
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  2. In mathematics, an infinitesimal number is a non-zero quantity that is closer to 0 than any non-zero real number is. The word infinitesimal comes from a 17th-century Modern Latin coinage infinitesimus, which originally referred to the " infinity - eth " item in a sequence.

  3. Use of Infinitesimals. The function α (x) is called infinitely small or an infinitesimal as x → a if. Let α (x) and β (x) be two infinitely small functions as x → a. If then we say that the function α (x) is an infinitesimal of higher order than β (x);

  4. Infinitesimal, in mathematics, a quantity less than any finite quantity yet not zero. Even though no such quantity can exist in the real number system, many early attempts to justify calculus were based on sometimes dubious reasoning about infinitesimals: derivatives were defined as ultimate ratios.

    • The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
  5. An infinitesimal is either a positive infinitesimal, a negative infinitesimal, or zero. In $\mathbb{R}$ there is only one infinitesimal, zero - this is precisely the Archimedean property of $\mathbb{R}$ .

  6. 4 days ago · An infinitesimal is some quantity that is explicitly nonzero and yet smaller in absolute value than any real quantity. The understanding of infinitesimals was a major roadblock to the acceptance of calculus and its placement on a firm mathematical foundation.

  7. When Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz first formulated differential calculus they effectively made use of the concept of an infinitesimal, which they referred to as an infinitely small number, whatever that was supposed to mean.