Quote: algebraic ideas appeared independently in Egypt, Babylon, China, Greece, and India

Quotation

Yet we need to notice that we are dealing with the independent appearance of algebraic ideas, and that the mathematics of Egypt, Babylon, China, Greece, and India was developing from within. Algebra is not, as often assumed, an artificial effort of human ingenuity, but rather the natural expression of man's interest in the numerical side of the universe of thought. Tables of squares and cubic numbers in Babylon; geometric progressions involving the idea of powers, together with linear and quadratic equations in Egypt; the so- called Pythagorean theorem in India, and possibly in China, before the time of Pythagoras; and the geometrical solution of quadratic equations even before Euclid in Greece, are not isolated facts of the history of mathematics.   Google-1   Google-2

Published before 1923

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Quote: algebra is the natural expression of man's interest in the numerical thought

Related Topics

Topic: history of mathematics (57 items)
Group: philosophy of mathematics   (11 topics, 330 quotes)