[R] Inconsistency of 1^NA=1 vs. 1.1^NA=NA

[Bert Gunter]

On Nov 17, 2016 11:55 AM, "Thierry Onkelinx" <thierry.onkelinx at inbo.be>
wrote:
>
> Dear Da,
>
> NA represents an unknown value x. 1 ^ x = 1 for all possible values of x.
> Hence 1 ^ NA = 1.
>
That is false. For any n, n-1 of the nth roots of 1 differ from 1(they are
complex). I don't have my computer with me. What does (1+ 0i)^ NA give?

Bert

> Best regards,
>
> ir. Thierry Onkelinx
> Instituut voor natuur- en bosonderzoek / Research Institute for Nature and
> Forest
> team Biometrie & Kwaliteitszorg / team Biometrics & Quality Assurance
> Kliniekstraat 25
> 1070 Anderlecht
> Belgium
>
> To call in the statistician after the experiment is done may be no more
> than asking him to perform a post-mortem examination: he may be able to
say
> what the experiment died of. ~ Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher
> The plural of anecdote is not data. ~ Roger Brinner
> The combination of some data and an aching desire for an answer does not
> ensure that a reasonable answer can be extracted from a given body of
data.
> ~ John Tukey
>
> 2016-11-17 20:19 GMT+01:00 Da Zheng <zhengda1936 at gmail.com>:
>
> > Hello,
> >
> > I just realized that 1^NA outputs 1 while 1.1^NA outputs NA in R v3.3.1
and
> > R v3.2.3.
> > I tried other values such as 0^NA and 2^NA, and they all output NA.
> > I don't understand this inconsistency here. Shouldn't 1^NA output NA as
> > well? Why does R handle it differently? Or is this a bug in these
> > particular versions of R?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Da
> >
> >         [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> > R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> > PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/
> > posting-guide.html
> > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
> >
>
>         [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> PLEASE do read the posting guide
http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.

	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]