From: Michel Van den Bergh <michel.vandenbergh at uhasselt.be>
I can't believe I am seeing this discussion once again. You would think
that by now people
would understand floating point arithmetic.
It is easy to forget that Maxima can be used in two very different
ways. Sometimes it is used as a module in service of some larger
computer program. Other times it is used as a symbolic desk
calculator. The natural expectation about the behavior of numbers is
different in these two uses, although those expectations are not
necessarily both legitimate.