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The Zero Story
One of the most significant intellectual revolutions in history was the introduction of the Arabic numbering system to Italy. At the close of the 12th century, Leonardo of Pisa — known today as Fibonacci — traveled to north Africa and learned a new form of mathematics that used the concept of zero. When he returned to Italy in 1202 and wrote Liber Abacci, a book about this new system, the world of mathematics was changed forever. The ripple effects spread to other fields as well and within a few decades even commerce was dramatically changed by the creation of double-entry bookkeeping.
Zero had two characteristics that made the Arabic numbering system so valuable. It created a placeholder making abstract operations possible, and it indicated a null value or the absence of value. The Arabs did not invent zero; they transported the concept from India to the West, refining it along the way.
The Arabic word for zero is sifr. The name Syfr is derived from that word, and the evolution of the concept of zero is a good metaphor for the corporation’s guiding principle: bringing fresh perspectives into the education field by importing examples from outside disciplines. The company’s logo, the sunflower, is based on Fibonacci’s work. His book used mathematics to describe patterns that occur in nature.
Some Notes on Language
Language reveals fascinating histories. The Babylonian contributions to mathematics were brought into modern English through Latin. The Babylonians used an abacus with pebbles as counters. The Latin word for pebble is calculus. Our words calcium (named for the type of rock used by the Babylonians), calculate and calculus all derive from those pebbles.
During the transportation of the new numbering system, the Arabic language also made its contribution to our mathematical vocabulary. As the Arabic numbering system moved west, al-Khowarizmi, a mathematician in Baghdad, wrote the first algebra book in 825 to calculate inheritance within Islamic law. The mathematical term algorithm was derived from his name and the word algebra from his book.
Because the Arabic numbering system with its concept of zero (sifr) was uncommon in Europe before 1200, many merchants used it to encode messages for secrecy. The English word cipher is derived from this use.
The concept of zero was so fundamental to the numbering system that the Russian word for number tsifr is derived from the same word sifr or zero.
Change and Time
It is difficult to imagine a world without zero, but there was a time when it did not exist as either a value or a placeholder. Although accomplished mathematicians, the Greeks and Egyptians were more concerned with measurement and geometry. It is no wonder that in modern mathematics classes even students as young as middle school study the contributions of Pythagoras and Euclid, while other Greek mathematicians are not covered. Geometry was the Greeks’ strength. Even Aristotle had difficulty with the concept of zero as a value because he did not believe that it was possible for a void to exist.
As the new numbering system permeated Europe, the old traditions died hard. It was centuries after Fibonacci before the Catholic Church formally accepted zero. Even in the 17th century, Descartes developed the Cartesian system of coordinate mathematics with the point (0,0) in the lower left hand corner because he was reluctant to cross over a null value into negative numbers.
Zero was an intellectual revolution. Within decades of Fibonacci and the introduction of zero as a placeholder, the worlds of mathematics and commerce were changed irrevocably. But in other instances, the acceptance of zero proceeded at what seems like a snail’s pace. The concept of a null value was slow to gain a following, and institutions like the church were slow to accept it. There were no real philosophical or religious obstacles to the idea of zero as a placeholder, so the change was almost instant. But acceptance of zero as a null value was hampered not only by belief structures but also by institutional roadblocks.
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