Binomial Coefficients are inconsistent with Partition Coefficients
In Sage:
binomial(-1,-1) = 0
I have complaint about this before: ask-sage and proposed the natural binomial(x,x) = 1 for all x.
I discussed the arguments in detail at sagemath-track where I opened a ticket.
One answer was: "Having binomial(z, z) != 1 is collateral damage."
There is also the damage of inconsistency.
For me inconsistency is what this code shows:
PartitionCoefficient = lambda p: mul(binomial(p[j], p[j+1]) for j in range(len(p)-1))
for n in (0..6):
for k in (0..n):
P = Partitions(n, max_part=k, inner=[k])
print sum(PartitionCoefficient(p) for p in P), binomial(n-1,k-1)
1 0
0 0
1 1
0 0
1 1
1 1
0 0
1 1
2 2
1 1
0 0
1 1
3 3
3 3
1 1
0 0
1 1
4 4
6 6
4 4
1 1
0 0
1 1
5 5
10 10
10 10
5 5
1 1
Another said: "Apparently Maple and Mathematica use the proposed version. Is that sufficient justification to change our version?"
Question: Is the internal consistency of Sage enough justification?
I think that the sage-devel Google group is the right place to discuss this. The ask.sagemath.org website doesn't get enough traffic to have a good discussion.
gp gives
Yeah, I think this one really depends a lot upon what (or whether there is) a consensus in this field is. Is this a case of Zero factorial = 1, or of zero to the zero = 1 (even the latter there is sort of a consensus in computers, but not as broad as factorial/gamma).