Q: What is the symbol associated with this matrix, on Google search pages and next to "Wolfram MathWorld", etc.→
A: That is an aleph. The aleph is the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. It was used by mathematician Georg Cantor to represent, when accompanied by a subscript, transfinite numbers. The Aleph (El Aleph) was also the title of a short story by Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges in which the universe in its entirety was contained and revealed by an "Aleph" beneath the cellar stairway of a house in Buenos Aires, this Aleph being just one (perhaps) of others, another perceivable as a hum emanating from within one of the stone pillars surrounding the courtyard of the Mosque of Amr, in Cairo, Borges' use having been suggested (as perhaps Cantor's) by the Kabbalah. The universal immanence of these "Alephs" was one source of inspiration for the Brazilian Matrix.
Borges' Aleph is here, in case you're interested:
O Aleph (português)
The Aleph (English)
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