Story of Maths: The Language of the Universe

            The film opened with Mark du Sautoy telling viewers that there is one discipline that yields certain knowledge - Mathematics. According to him, the most basic concept of math: space and quantity where hard wired into our brains. The story suggests that the first signs of Mathematics emerged in Egypt particularly during the flooding of the River Nile[1]. The flooding of the Nile River was the most important event for Egyptian agriculture for this serves as a marker to start each new year.

The Egyptians, as related by the film were the earliest mathematical innovators. They use certain parts of their bodies to measure things and this is where their standard units of measurements evolved. They also use figures to represent numbers and the type of their number system is decimal. Also, they have no concept of a place value but despite of this, the Egyptians were brilliant problem solvers. The Egyptian scribes use sheets of papyrus to record their Mathematical discoveries but due to its delicate material, it decayed over time. The most important document so far preserved today relating to Egyptian mathematics is the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus. The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus serves as a modern-day gateway to revisite and look into the types of problems the Egyptians have to deal with in their mathematics and how their concepts of multiplication and division were carried out. 

The story further tells about the Eye of Horus which became the earliest representation of fractions. Each part of the eye represented a different fraction. The Egyptians were also the first one to discover shapes, the circle of which was one of the most important amongst them. The theory of how the relationship between a circle and to its closeness in area to a square with sides of eight was through ancient game of Mancala. The player must have realized that the stones fill the circular holes of the mancala board in a nice way and he might have then experimented in making larger circles. One imposing and majestic symbol of the Egyptian mathematics was the pyramid. Some have suggested that another important mathematical concept was hidden in the proportions of the pyramid and that was the concept of the golden ratio. The golden ratio has been associated to perfect proportion all over the world. The Egyptians revealed the power of geometry and numbers and made the first moves towards some of the exciting mathematical discoveries to come.

             Next to the Egyptians was the Babylonians. The Babylonian became masters in managing and manipulating numbers. The scribes were the one who kept records of wealthy families and for the temples of palaces. Their records were kept on clay tablets. Like the Egyptians, the Babylonians were interested in solving practical problems where their solutions are written like mathematical recipes.  The Babylonians though were not using powers of 10 like the Egyptians do but were using the powers of 60 instead.  They use the 10 knuckles on one hand and the five fingers on the other to be able to count 60 different numbers. The base 60 system are still being used to this day. The most important feature of the Babylonians’ number system was that it recognized a place value. They also have regular system for measurement and it was in perfect harmony with their number system that suits both for observation and calculation purposes. They also created the symbol zero in order to calculate and cope with large numbers. The quadratic equation was one of the greatest legacies of Babylonian mathematics. This involves things where the unknown quantity is multiplied by itself. The Babylonians spearheaded intellectual progress in the ancient world but when their imperial power began to wane, so did their intellectual vigor.

            The Greeks follows the Babylonians. The Greeks were also passionate about mathematics and were clever colonists. One of their greatest contributions was the power of proof. Pythagoras, a Greek mathematician was credited for the transformation of mathematics from a tool for accounting to the analytical subject that is recognized today. He also contributed for the properties of the right angle triangles or what is known today as the Pythagoreans Theorem..   Several Greeks also emerged as great mathematicians, among them are (1) Plato – one the most important patrons of mathematics who argued that “mathematics is an important form of knowledge”; (2) Euclid – wrote the Elements built on a series of mathematical assumptions called axioms; (3) Archimedes – contributed to the discovery of the polygons; and (4) Hypatia – a female mathematician determined to keep the legacy of the Greeks alive.

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[1] River Nile is thought of as the life line of Eypt