Why does accessing the first element of a list yield "List"

Asked Oct 09 '19 at 19:52

Active Nov 19 '19 at 13:35

Viewed 52 times

I have a list of expressions

listOfStuff = {-(b^(3/2)/Sqrt[7 \[Pi]]), b^(3/2)/Sqrt[7 \[Pi]]}

When I try to access the first element of this list like so

First[listOfStuff]

This yields

-(b^(3/2)/Sqrt[7 \[Pi]])

If I try to access it either of the following two ways

listOfStuff[[0]]
Part[listOfStuff, 0]

I get

List

The notebook literally just prints "List". I'm new to Mathematica but not new to programming languages in general. I really don't understand what is going on here. Any help understanding this would be appreciated.

asked Oct 09 '19 at 19:52

derangedhk417

listOfStuff[[1]] is the First element. – corey979 Oct 09 '19 at 19:58
2

see Head >> Properties and Relations – kglr Oct 09 '19 at 20:04
3

Oh I'm dumb. Forgot arrays start at one. Thanks. – derangedhk417 Oct 09 '19 at 20:09
List indexing in Mathematica starts from 1. However, the index zero contains the Head which is List in this case. – Sâu Nov 19 '19 at 14:40

Why does accessing the first element of a list yield "List"

0 Answers0