What is Digg?64 Comments
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+28Firefox rules.
- 3wiid, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7226516301910438112&q=
It was the Indians, Brahmagupta in approx 620 AD it is said...
I can't believe I finally joined digg over nothing. - damentz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9Christians murdered people for thinking that there is such thing as nothingness/void, so they would not add it into math. Eventually due to new restrictions working in math without zero, they eventually stopped crucifying mathemeticians. I read it in the book "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea", they kind of word it a lot more nicely though.
Though I don't know what is so hard to think about that caused them to hate vacuums (area of nothing), - cougar618, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7No, but he helped pass a bill that made it possible to invent the zero.
- Brajeshwar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7I'd always believed the ZERO was invented by Indian Mathematicians long back. Don't get me wrong but I think that is what most of us believed.
- 0x0000ff, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Firefox + AdBlock extension
- gagan97, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5i had info that indians invented it... where did this mayas come... jst becoz they are related to US roots.. u cant give maya every credit.. grow up plz.. amricans.. chritinas came long after the.. india, chinese, african and islamic civilizations matured ..
- StealthMonkey, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8What's a pop-up? Oh wait... I think I remember them from the pre-Firefox days.
- sooperdooper, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Good point, except that the article credits the Mayan culture with independently developing the idea as well (by 36 BC, the article fails to mention). Oh, and nevermind that the Mayan civilization flourished from 250-900AD.
- AudioPhil3, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6I'm sending this article back to it's origin.
-1 - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4In 498 AD, Indian mathematician and astronomer Aryabhata stated that "Stanam stanam dasa gunam" or place to place in ten times in value, which may be the origin of the modern decimal based place value notation.[7]
The oldest known text to use zero is the Jain text from India entitled the Lokavibhaaga, dated 458 AD. [8]
The first indubitable appearance of a symbol for zero appears in 876 in India on a stone tablet in Gwalior. Documents on copper plates, with the same small o in them, dated back as far as the sixth century AD, abound.[9]
[edit]
Rules of Brahmagupta
The rules governing the use of zero appeared for the first time in Brahmagupta's book Brahmasputha Siddhanta, written in 628. Here Brahmagupta considers not only zero, but negative numbers, and the algebraic rules for the elementary operations of arithmetic with such numbers. In some instances, his rules differ from the modern standard. Here are the rules of Brahamagupta:[10]
The sum of two positive quantities is positive
The sum of two negative quantities is negative
The sum of zero and a negative number is negative
The sum of a positive number and zero is positive
The sum of zero and zero is zero
The sum of a positive and a negative is their difference; or, if they are equal, zero
In subtraction, the less is to be taken from the greater, positive from positive
In subtraction, the less is to be taken from the greater, negative from negative
When the greater however, is subtracted from the less, the difference is reversed
When positive is to be subtracted from negative, and negative from positive, they must be added together
The product of a negative quantity and a positive quantity is negative
The product of a negative quantity and a negative quantity is positive
The product of two positive, is positive
Positive divided by positive or negative by negative is positive
Positive divided by negative is negative. Negative divided by positive is negative
A positive or negative number when divided by zero is a fraction with the zero as denominator
Zero divided by a negative or positive number is either zero or is expressed as a fraction with zero as numerator and the finite quantity as denominator
Zero divided by zero is zero.
_______________________________________source:wikipedia.org.
Give indians some credit. - csrster, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Two more links
Zero: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/inourtime_20040513.shtml
Indian maths (including zero): http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/inourtime_20061214.shtml - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Why does everyone else say the ancient Hindus created it?
- hypnotizd, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3@ 0x0000ff
I'm using FF 2.0.0.1 with Adblock Plus 0.7.2.4 and I still got that pop up. Did you even go to the website? - Urusai, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I thought zero was invented when Spinal Tap needed a volume so low it was like turning off their amps.
- globular, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2inaccurate - it was the indians first
- sfacets, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Before Zero was invented we used to call it _____. Of course, this soon became highly annoying and made old people turn up their hearing aids.
- d17182, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Printer version:
http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=000A41D6-B959-1C71-9EB7809EC588F2D7 - Gumby902, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Interesting read. The BBC did an nice documentary on the history of '1' with Terry Jones. Google video link: http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=7226516301910438112&q=terry+Jones
- JeffBoyaredi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea"
Great Book!
The point about zero is that we do not need to use it in the
operations of daily life. No one goes out to buy zero fish.
It is in a way the most civilized of all the cardinals, and
its use is only forced on us by the needs of cultivated
modes ofthought.
—Alfred North Whitehead - jakdracula, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I thought the first TRUE zero was John Kerry.
- Schmerz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1And here you are refuting information by saying its "wrong information". Please backup any claims, unless you want to be a hypocrite.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1an ignorant comment like that coming from someone with an Indian name is pityful, especially as it is not true. And he knows it. Many comments on this thread alone confirm that; there are enough reliable resources on the net that can be used to substantiate it.
Anil - so you claim to be an Oracle servant. Enjoy getting buried! - punchingjudy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1May I also recommend Everything Forever's take on Zero?
http://everythingforever.com/st_math.htm
(Edit: the site may look like a new-age romp through stupid, but it's actually physics-oriented. Sci-Am even likes it. It's an oldie, but a goodie.) - bwoodall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1so THAT"S what happened to Terry Jones...
good find, great video - jhnewt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Uh what? From the article: "in mathematics we can generate all numbers from the empty set"
I didn't think that was true. Can someone explain? - rstarr, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I always heard the Mayans invented the concept.
- tastypastry, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I'm on FF and still got that pop-up.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I would assume that it would be rather difficult to give a value to nothing
- uggidi, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1had to bury this...
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1More in depth article here.
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Zero.html - Farticus, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I think they need to give credit elsewhere too, http://mathforum.org/k12/mayan.math/
Their idea may go back to 3000 BC or before. - megagram, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Ever wonder how did we indicated meaningfulness before grammar? We need a brief overview behind the history of grammar.
....I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. :D - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Gore merely helps to define zero. What a hero :-)
- greyfade, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1that was the same stance the ancient Greeks took. it wasn't until zero had been in wide usage in the middle east that the Greeks realized the importance of including nothing in their mathematics.
- yahoofrom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10 = empty set
1 = union of {0} and 0
2 = union of {1} and 1
and so on. - greyfade, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1the book to read is "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" by Charles Seife. it covers the entire history of the number, from its first well-known usage to today, with a number of quite entertaining discussions on its importance in mathematics. (the story of Zeno's paradox is particularly interesting as it introduces the concept of mathematical limits, the basis of Calculus.)
- chillbox, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2IT WAS THE PHOENICIANS DAMNIT!
- mayurpatil, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1It isnt a popup just another window
- SJKat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Zero is not nothing. Zero implies that there actually could be something to measure, or at least there is a notion of it. So it is nowhere near nothing.
- GreenStar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Zero sum game (a small video)
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=1752156861900005685&q=india+zero - ClayDragon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Way more information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0_%28number%29
And this particular link at the bottom offers much more history:
http://www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/HistTopics/Zero.html - Aiwanei, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1There is an amazing book by Charles Seife "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" that chronicles the struggle that the idea of zero went through all the way from Babylonian times (and their base 60 system) to modern day. It deals with the church's attempts at completely abolishing it and how this number managed to survive. Amazon link is: http://www.amazon.com/Zero-Charles-Seife/dp/0285635948/sr=8-3/qid=1169021940/ref=sr_1_3/102-1553728-5500116?ie=UTF8&s=books
Just saw Damentz up above talked about it too. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4could not even get to the site. will not digg. Indians invented zero. Not surprising if you know anything about their 5000 year old culture or have spent time researching the Vedanta.
- wiremonkeymommy, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2"Arab merchants brought the zero they found in India to the West."
where did they find it? was it the only one the Indians had? did the Indians get mad they took it? how did they package it for the journey... dammit, I'll never sleep again! - dev3, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0damn! The author gets a 0 for this
- nonabandit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0because there are (almost) more indians than any other people and they (rather, all of us) keep insisting on this one thing that (supposedly) happened five thousand years ago :-D
- fishpen0, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I got Firefox 2.0 with adblock. I give props to all supporters of FF
- ruwanraj, on 12/12/2007, -0/+0First person to introduce the modern number system to Europe was Fibonacci (also known as Leonardo of Pisa). He knew numbers were originated in India and he called the mathematics came along with it (or todays arithmetic) "Modus Indorem" or "method of the Indians". The numebers he called "nine figures of the indians with symbol ziphra". Please see what he wrote in 1100 AD.
"After my father's appointment by his homeland as state official in the customs house of Bugia for the Pisan merchants who thronged to it, he took charge; and in view of its future usefulness and convenience, had me in my boyhood come to him and there wanted me to devote myself to and be instructed in the study of calculation for some days. There, following my introduction, as a consequence of marvelous instruction in the art, to the nine digits of the Hindus, the knowledge of the art very much appealed to me before all others, and for it I realized that all its aspects were studied in Egypt, Syria, Greece, Sicily, and Provence, with their varying methods; and at these places thereafter, while on business. I pursued my study in depth and learned the give-and-take of disputation. But all this even, and the algorism, as well as the art of Pythagoras, I considered as almost a mistake in respect to the method of the Hindus (Modus Indorum). Therefore, embracing more stringently that method of the Hindus, and taking stricter pains in its study, while adding certain things from my own understanding and inserting also certain things from the niceties of Euclid's geometric art. I have striven to compose this book in its entirety as understandably as I could, dividing it into fifteen chapters. Almost everything which I have introduced I have displayed with exact proof, in order that those further seeking this knowledge, with its pre-eminent method, might be instructed, and further, in order that the Latin people might not be discovered to be without it, as they have been up to now. If I have perchance omitted anything more or less proper or necessary, I beg indulgence, since there is no one who is blameless and utterly provident in all things. The nine Indian figures are: 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1. With these nine figures, and with the sign 0 ... any number may be written. -
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