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  • $\begingroup$ It is strange that Plot silently fails while e.g. NIntegrate gives a helpful error message: y = sin[x] + cos[x]; NIntegrate[y, {x, 0, 2 Pi}] NIntegrate::inumr: The integrand cos[x]+sin[x] has evaluated to non-numerical values for all sampling points in the region with boundaries {{0,6.28319}}. >>. Is there any sound reason for that omission or should this really be a feature? $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 3, 2016 at 23:50
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    $\begingroup$ @masterxilo There used to be such an error message in Mathematica -- it was removed in version 6. And it looks like Szabolcs complained about that then. Maybe the thinking was that a graphics command does not need to provide a mathematically rigorous result, so it should just do the best it can and not bother you with error messages. That makes it less annoying when plotting a function that is only real over a restricted range, but I agree that a message might be helpful when the function is nonnumerical everywhere. $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 4, 2016 at 7:39
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    $\begingroup$ @masterxilo At one point the message could be turned back on with On[General::plnr], but that doesn't seem to work any more. $\endgroup$ Commented Jul 4, 2016 at 7:42