| This is my second response (read the other one first...) Upon deeper thought as to why a factorial might fail -- aren't these tables sort of like derivatives? If so -- then we might want to consider thinking about the derivative of a factorial: https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/300526/derivative-o... Hey, the smart people StackExchange tell me that you can't take the derivative of a factorial (well, not in usual Calculus -- at least not without using the Gamma function, as you previously aluded to!) >"I am not a mathematician. Neither are you." Well then, one fellow, ahem, "Non-Mathematician" to another(!) -- let me lay out a mathematical speculation/conjecture for you... I'll bet that somehow Mathologer's tables -- which are based on subtraction -- and fail to work with recursive functions that use multiplication -- could indeed work with even those functions(!) -- if they could somehow be constructed instead -- out of Gamma functions! Why? Well simply because you can take the derivative of a Gamma function -- whereas you can't for a factorial! Now, if such a table as alluded to above could in fact be constructed -- that might be an interesting area of mathematical research! I don't currently have the time or resources to prove or disprove that it could or couldn't... But that it could is my bet, my speculation, my conjecture! One "non-Mathematician" -- to another! <g> :-) And we'll see if time proves it to be correct or incorrect! |