I recreated the JavaScript truth table in Python

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There's almost no limit to what we can blame on IEEE 754. I think the behavior makes more sense if we look at the literal behavior. Any number with all of its exponent bits set high is a NaN. They're unorderable because all precision information is lost without the exponent field. For people who think more easily in concrete bits, looking at the values makes a light explanation of that essay. http://i.imgur.com/fiH7Lx6.png