Imaginary Numbers and Real Numbers

Some terms in the English language may be somewhat misleading, for example, a white lie. Right now you might be thinking: How can a lie be white? In the English language it is a lie that is intentioned to help in a good way but is not the truth. The same applies to many other words like imaginary numbers and real numbers. An imaginary number doesn't mean a non-existent number and a real number doesn't …

…found out a little bit about it, your thought might have been: What does this have to do with mathematics? Anyone, who hasn't heard of it before, might think: Imaginary is something from my imagination, so an imaginary number must be a non-existent number that is also from my imagination. That's not true. When you think about something that seems kind of awkward you should "think outside the box", from all different directions and viewpoints.