[adrian_b]

Only in school exercises you can solve a differential equation by expanding a sine function into a Taylor series.

In practical physics computations, the solution of differential equations requires numerical methods that do not use the Taylor series of specific functions, even if the theory used for developing the algorithms may use the Taylor series development of arbitrary functions.

For accurate prediction, the simple pendulum equation also requires in practice such numerical methods, which do not rely on the small-angle approximation that enables the use of the Taylor series of the trigonometric functions, for didactic purposes.

[i_no_can_eat]

> Only in school exercises you can solve a differential equation by expanding a sine function into a Taylor series.

> In practical physics computations, the solution of differential equations requires numerical methods that do not use the Taylor series of specific functions, even if the theory used for developing the algorithms may use the Taylor series development of arbitrary functions.

I'm sorry, but you have no idea what you're talking about. Series expansions is one of the most widely used techniques in Physics. Obviously some equations require full blown numerical methods to be solved, but one can do a whole lot with analytical techniques by doing series expansions and using perturbation theory.

Saying that this is only used "in school exercises" shows that you're completely out of touch with reality.

[adrian_b]

You have replied to something that I have not said.

I have said that the Taylor series of arbitrary functions have various uses, but there is no benefit in knowing which are the specific Taylor expansions of the trigonometric functions, with the exception of knowing that the first term of the sine and tangent expansions when the argument is in radians is just X.

Solving physics problems using the expansion of an unknown function in the Taylor series has nothing to do with knowing which is the Taylor series of the sine function.

[i_no_can_eat]

> with the exception of knowing that the first term of the sine and tangent expansions when the argument is in radians is just X.

There are more terms in the expansion that you can use, that's the whole point of using an expansion...

> Solving physics problems using the expansion of an unknown function in the Taylor series has nothing to do with knowing which is the Taylor series of the sine function.

I hope you're aware that the sine function appears quite often in Physics problems.