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What is the origin of zero? »
Posted by: capn_caveman 1 year, 8 months agoA brief history behind the number zero.
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capn_caveman
I'm an engineer that loves 'anything' science. I'm interested in physics, astronomy, space exploration, Earth sciences, and mathematics to name just a few ...
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Comments: 22
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plowshare
Jan. 16, 2007, 8:15 p.m.Fascinating -- until now I accepted the conventional wisdom that zero was the invention of mathematicians in India, less than 2 millennia ago. Now it appears they go more than three millennia further back.
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Rabbi
Jan. 17, 2007, 4:52 a.m.India invented the Number System. Zero was invented by Aryabhatta. The place value system, the decimal system was developed in India in 100 BC. Aryabhatta was the first to explain spherical shape, size ,diameter, rotation and correct speed of Earth in 499 AD.The World's first university was established in Takshila in 700 BC. Students from all over the World studied more than 60 subjects.
The Indian Nobel Prize winner CV Raman gave zero value. Infinty the double horizontal zeros is also acknowledged as and Indian invention.The University of Nalanda built in the 4th century was one of the greatest achievements of ancient India in the field of education.The art of Navigation was born in the river Sindh 6000 years ago. The word 'Navigation' is derived from the Sanskrit word NAVGATIH. The word navy is also derived from Sanskrit 'Nou'.
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plowshare
Jan. 19, 2007, 11:04 a.m.I'm puzzled by your comment about how a Nobel Prize winner "gave zero value". Please explain what this means.
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Rabbi
Jan. 17, 2007, 5:34 a.m.What morons can Harvard produce to revise History? The Mesopotamians did make significant contributions as did the Greeks. In Siddhanta Siromani (Bhuvanakosam ) Bhaskaracharya II described about gravity of earth about 400 years before Sir Isaac Newton. He also had some clear notions on differential calculus, and the Theory of Continued Fraction.
Madhavacharya discovered Taylor series of Sine and Cosine function about 250 years before Taylor.
Madhavacharya discovered Newton Power series.
Madhavacharya discovered Gregory Leibnitz series for the Inverse Tangent about 280 years before Gregory.
Madhavacharya discovered Leibnitz power series for pi about 300 years before Leibnitz.
Bhaskaracharya calculated the time taken by the earth to orbit the sun hundreds of years before the astronomer Smart. Time taken by earth to orbit the sun: (5th century) 365.258756484 days
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Ratskii
Jan. 17, 2007, 4:19 p.m.Watched a special on PBS about the discovery of a palimpsest that overwrote a work of Archemedes in the third century BC. It is a work of mathematics which includes the use of differentials to calculate the areas between irregular curves. In other words it is the first discovered work of calculus.
I also seem to remember something about Aristarchus calculating the circumference of the world in the third century BC. I'll have to check that; it may have been someone else.
Don't mean to in anyway reduce the considerable achievements of Madhavacharya. He was a great man and mathematician.
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mbkijb
Jan. 17, 2007, 5:44 a.m.My first child's father was one of them- a complete total zero. I hope he is proud.
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TipsOfAllSorts
Jan. 17, 2007, 7:22 a.m.The Story of 1 - In india is where Terry Jones (the host of this fact-and-humor-filled documentary) tracks down the first use of "zero". Here 'The Story Of 1' takes a romantic turn in which the number One found his perfect mate Zero. It was a union that has since changed the world... http://www.pbs.org/previews/storyof1/
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procyon
Jan. 17, 2007, 7:43 a.m.Zero itself does not correspond to any tangible item, so it was probably not 'counted' until early man ran out of fingers to count tangible items on. This gave us a math system based on ten, with a zero marker to indicate 'ten once.' This is illustrated by the abacus, an early counting machine.
The binary system was conceived much later, from drivers giving each other the finger, and led to the development of computers.
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mbkijb
Jan. 17, 2007, 2:52 p.m.thanks! :) Doesn't make up for the fact that he did two things.... 1.) totally ruined my life and future at the time. For that, he can rot in the bowels of hell, and I hope he does, and 2.) Gave me the most beautiful kid one could ever wish for, both inside and out. For that, I have to step aside and be thankful. She is 15 and it is his loss, not mine. I hope Karma comes back to kill him, and I mean that most sincerely. Old wounds die hard. Like I said, I hope he is proud of himself.
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walden3
Jan. 17, 2007, 2:11 p.m.doesn't that mean that the godless islamo fascist terrorist invented it then?
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Rabbi
Jan. 17, 2007, 2:32 p.m.The correct answer is that whilst many had symbols that looked like a ball or a circle, it was the Indians who invented the numeral zero. They also gave it value for which CV Raman won the Nobel prize. It had no value ascribable to it by any other culture or race till he gave it value. Its value had existed in Sanskrit and Vedic teachings something no one actually bothered to decode. The Indian civilization had contributed much to the civilizations of its neighbours because of the uniqueness of India many of its inhabitants and its neighbours came from each other and contributed to their respective civilizations. There are other areas such as pythagores theorem which is named after the Greek who studied at the Hindu university then returned to Europe with the theory that was never his. The Arabs funnily enough refer to numerals as Hindu numerals whilst we in the west call it the Arabic numeral.
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mjasong1
Jan. 17, 2007, 4:18 p.m.Many people also might not know why the number zero is shaped like it is. It is shaped as an oval because of it's absence of angles. You can visit my website and see the whole explanation here (just copy and paste the link below)
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.
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