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I wish to use algebra to (is the term truncate?) the set of positive integers to the first 8 and call it for example 'n'.

In order to define $r_n = 2n$ or similar.

This means:

$r_0 = 0$ $r_1 = 2$ $\ldots$ $r_7 = 14$

However there would not be an $r_8$.

edit: Changed "undefined" to "would not be", sorry about this.

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    Sorry axblount, fixed.2012-08-21

3 Answers 3

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You've tagged this and but it's not entirely clear what you mean.

However, by these tags, perhaps you are referring to $\left(\Bbb Z_8, +\right)$?

In such a case, you have $r_1+r_7 = 1+_8 7 = 8 \mod 8 = 0$. So there is no $r_8$ per se; however, the re-definition of the symbols $r_0, r_1, \ldots$ is superfluous.

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    It got re-tagged -- there is an [tag:algebra-precalculus] tag that someone put there for you :)2012-08-21
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You could simply write

"Let $r_n = 2n$ for all integers $n$ from $0$ to $7$."

or perhaps

"Let $r_n = 2n$ for $n \in \{0,1,2,\dotsc,7\}$."

or, using the compact notation suggested by Ilya,

"Let $r_n = 2n$ for $n \in \overline{0,7}$."

or even, if it's clear from context that $n$ is an integer,

"Let $r_n = 2n$ for $0 \le n \le 7$."

However, if going with Ilya's notation, be aware that many English-speaking readers may not be familiar with it, so you should define it yourself, e.g. "Let $\overline{n,m} = \{n,\,\dotsc,\,m\}$ denote the set of integers between $n$ and $m$ inclusive."

(Ps. What's wrong with MathJax's rendering of \overline, anyway? The lines in my examples above seem to curve upwards at the ends like this, while the first — but not the second — one in Ilya's comment curves the other way.)

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    The overline is straight here, on Windows 7 with Firefox 7. Thanks Ilmari Karonen, that makes a lot of sence reguarding ∈. I've removed the comment to which it referred because it was long, wrong and now just in the way.2012-08-26
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$r_n = 2n$ if $0 ≤ n ≤ 7$

Thanks Ilmari Karonen for the correction.

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    I've never seen this particular notation, and I'd avoid it because it looks confusingly similar to standard [set-builder notation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set-builder_notation). However, you could simply dispense with the curly braces and write "$r_n = 2n$ if $0 \le n \le 7$", which is perfectly understandable.2012-08-26