linguistic:translation, linguistic:paraphrasing
Finite total orders

A simple counting argument will verify that any non-empty finite totally ordered set (and hence any non-empty subset thereof) has a least element. Thus every finite total order is in fact a well order. Either by direct proof or by observing that every well order is order isomorphic to an ordinal one may show that every finite total order is order isomorphic to an initial segment of the natural numbers ordered by <. In other words, a total order on a set with k elements induces a bijection with the first k natural numbers. Hence it is common to index finite total orders or well orders with order type ω by natural numbers in a fashion which respects the ordering (either starting with zero or with one).