Python: Find out how positive a number is with respect to 0

Question

Let's say I have the below list:

o =[[-0.90405713, -0.86583093, -0.14048125]]

How do I find out how positive each element of o[0] is?

So,by looking at this I know that -0.14048125 is the most "positive" with respect to 0 on the number line. Is there a way to do this via a python code?

What do you mean by "most positive with respect to 0" Smallest absolute value? — Christian König, May 04 '17 at 12:41
Closing as duplicate. Will reopen if question is edited. In the current state, it's just a duplicate. — Jean-François Fabre, May 04 '17 at 12:44
Is `0` kind of the most positive with all respect due to him? If yes I have absolutely 0 reason to be negative about my bank statement! — Drag and Drop, May 04 '17 at 12:52

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered May 04 '17 at 12:43

3

If you want the value closest to 0, you could use min with abs as key:

>>> o =[-0.90405713,-0.86583093,-0.14048125,3]
>>> min(o, key=abs)
-0.14048125

answered May 04 '17 at 12:43

Eric Duminil

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nice but that doesn't seem to answer the question. – Jean-François Fabre May 04 '17 at 12:49
@Jean-FrançoisFabre: To be honest, I probably don't understand the question. My answer is just an alternative to the obvious `max(o)`. It does work fine with the provided example, though. – Eric Duminil May 04 '17 at 12:51
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let's wait for the OP to edit the question. – Jean-François Fabre May 04 '17 at 12:52

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered May 04 '17 at 12:41

0

use max()

>>> o =[-0.90405713,-0.86583093,-0.14048125]
>>> max(o)
-0.14048125

answered May 04 '17 at 12:41

akash karothiya

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Oh man! Thanks so much! It just didn't strike me to think of this. For some reason I was approaching this with respect to the number line and was thinking that I needed to do some mathematical calculations – user1452759 May 04 '17 at 13:57

Python: Find out how positive a number is with respect to 0

2 Answers2