Aubrey Jaffer wrote:
>> Another possibility is to use the word "natural" for nonnegative
>> integers:
>>
>> exact           64.bit natural-number           #nA:natural-64
>> exact           32.bit natural-number           #nA:natural-32
>> exact           16.bit natural-number           #nA:natural-16
>> exact           8.bit natural-number            #nA:natural-8

bear wrote:
> Nix.  Not what mathematicians mean by "natural numbers." Guaranteed to
> cause confusion when someone presumes that he can't store zero, or is
> allowed to divide by something because it can't be zero, etc.

I suspect that you have natural numbers and whole numbers confused. The
natural numbers are the non-negative integers, and the whole numbers are
the positive integers.

> "Nonnegative" is the word that means what you want in mathematics,

"Non-negative integer" and "natural number" are synonymous.
--
Bradd W. Szonye
http://www.szonye.com/bradd