A Glimpse to the History of Mathematics

            Mathematics, a lot of people would say, difficult, numbers, mathematical formulae or a study of numbers but I would simply define it as a universal language. It has proven its worth in my life, whenever I run while calculating the time left running before getting late in my first subject, paying the fare when riding an “HH” or “Princess” going to CSM or counting the money left from my allowance after spending the whole week like a millionaire.

            The language of maths is extremely different from the languages I have known, it has its own grammar, it has its own version of a sentence or words represented by numbers, figures and symbols and can be comprehended through logical analysis.

            “The Story of Maths” is a four-part television series which summarizes the different aspects of the history of mathematics. The first episode which is entitled as “Language of the Universe” depicted how their discovery of simple counting before became the underpinning of the complex maths that we currently know. As people became more civilized, the necessity to count, measure and weigh is highly vital in their lives before.

            Marcus du Sautoy, a professor of mathematics from Oxford University commenced his first adventure to the historic Egypt particularly in the Nile River, where their first concept of maths was born.  There is a connection between bureaucracy and the development of mathematics in Egypt as they become civilized and developed, the use of their body parts to measure an agricultural land for taxation purposes and the use of fractions in the market or through trading which is represented by the eye of Horus as a symbol wherein each part of the eye represents a different fraction. It only showed that Egyptians were able to find solutions into their increasing needs before. The number system that we are using is very different to theirs, they had no concept of place value nor zero and they use different symbols to represent different numbers. Next stop is the land between rivers, Mesopotamia where the Babylonians uses the sexegesimal or the base 60 system, this system is common whenever we tell time, an hour is equivalent to 60 minutes or a minute is equal to 60 seconds and that kind of concept and they are also credited for introducing the quadratic equations in measuring land areas. We completed the first episode by visiting the all-time classic, Greece. It is where the concept and systems of mathematical proof originated. The place where the world-renowned and legendary mathematicians in history were born, like Archimedes, Plato and Pythagoras which was made famous by his Pythagorean Theorem. The Greeks introduced the fundamentals of algebra and geometry which contributed largely to the mathematics that we have known today.

            The film should have explained clearly some of the concepts about mathematics of the three different civilization. I would also recommend to add more animations and other ways of representing the notions, aside from making it playful to the eyes, it also allows the viewers to visualize the concepts that they were referring to. Subtitles on the first and succeeding episodes could also be included because some of the words uttered by the presenter are difficult to understand. They were able to show how did the different civilizations showcased their mathematical prowess that lead to the development of mathematics. Above all, I would rate it 9.6 out of 10 for its informative and relevant approach to the viewers. I am satisfied enough to be fed with fascinating information and facts about mathematics and its history but still thrilled to view the next episode.

            The first episode uplifted my appreciation to mathematics, as a person that is not so fond of maths, I was able to apprehend the idea on why should we consider mathematics as one of the languages of the universe. But did you get the idea why is considered as a universal language? English, Chinese, Russian or Arabian languages are different from each other but the language of maths is the same in all parts of the globe, no matter what race you belong, adding one plus one would still result to two or multiplying three by four would always be equal to nine.

            The concept of mathematics is above par, a language built with extraordinary principles and notions which became one of the greatest foundations and biggest achievements of humanity that trailed to the enormous scientific and mathematical breakthroughs.