My brother is a first grade school teacher.

One of the things he taught last week was different number systems like roman numerals, mayan numbers etc.

He just played a voicemail from a very angry abusive parent complaining the her son said the teacher was going to teach them arabic numbers.

Very threatening voice mail. He turned it over to the district.

I am shaking my head.

We live in interesting times.

;)

That's not the first time that's happened in terms of teaching Arabic numbers! As for the threats, what normally happens is the parent gets banned from school grounds. Tell your brother to follow on the outcome. If he is a union member, the union will advocate for him.

The fact that a portion of the U.S. population has no idea that the numbers we use (1, 2, 3, etc.) are Arabic numerals just shows how stupid some people really are. It reminds me of the Congressional representative who urged his followers not to eat French fries because France wasn't supporting us in our invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The parent is really going to have a melt down when the kid brings "al-jabr" (algebra) home.


>>It all started back around 825 AD when a man named Abū ʿAbdallāh Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī, the “father” of Algebra, wrote a book called “Kitab al-jabr wa al-muqabalah”. This roughly translates to “Rules of Reintegration and Reduction”

Also, "al-Khwārizmī" is the origin of our word "algorithm".

Other Arabic-derived words: Alhambra (palace/fortress in Granada, Spain), Almagest (Claudius Ptolemy's second century CE book on astronomy). The Arabs kept Greek mathematics and science alive while Christian Europe was doing its best to stomp them out.

Let's not forget astronomy!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Arabic_star_names

"In Western astronomy, most of the accepted star names are Arabic"

Aldebaran
Altair
Arrakis (real star! I did not know that)
Betelgeuse
Deneb
Fomalhaut
Rigel
…and many more!

My new favorite, Betelgeuse: "Armpit of the Central One"

Say it three times. I dare you.

BOJ: You're the only person I've ever known to make math interesting. Thanks for that! There's always, always something amazing to learn. Everywhere. About everything. But some people are better at explaining things.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/27/2020 04:34PM by Nightingale.

Just so we're clear, lots of us find math interesting. And vital to navigating in the modern world.

Agreed enthusiastically.

Yes, I understand that many do like it. Just saying that to me I didn't as a student in school. I didn't find a math teacher that made it understandable to me until I did a math upgrade after high school to get into nursing school.

I wasn't making a statement against math teachers or meaning to indicate that math isn't interesting to anybody. Just that to me, it was the bane of my school years as I was just absolutely no good at it. I always felt like I'd missed a vital lesson along the way that would have unlocked it for me. When a high school math teacher told me that I was the worst student she'd ever had, that didn't help! I was just naturally good at reading, bad at math. But I recognized it's a vital skill to learn.

It made a lot more sense to me in nursing when it was used by us to calculate medication dosages. When I could see it used in a practical setting, iow. (Thankfully for the welfare of the patients!)

So, yeah, I know many people understand it and even enjoy it. I've only started to experience the latter since I've been reading BoJ's posts that make it relatable in the real world for me. And yeah, it's even starting to get slightly interesting. :)

Still, don't give me a test on it. It kind of goes in, then out.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/2020 02:20PM by Nightingale.

Al-jabr. Had no idea. Love it.

al bundy

Khwarizimi was an Iranian, and the Greeks almost count as proto-Muslims too. . .

Maybe macaRomney is right and the quadratic equation is evil. All good learning, after all, is Murican learning!

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Other Arabic-derived words: Alhambra
> (palace/fortress in Granada, Spain), Almagest
> (Claudius Ptolemy's second century CE book on
> astronomy). The Arabs kept Greek mathematics and
> science alive while Christian Europe was doing its
> best to stomp them out.

That's paint by numbers history.

The Arabs stole a lead because they adapted INDIAN mathematics. Indian numerals are the basis of modern Arabic numbers, and included the concept of zero. They were also much easier to work with than Greek or Roman numerals. This was the most important advance for all concerned, and is due partly to an accident of geography, i.e. that the Muslim Empires spanned the space between the Hellenic/Roman cultural space, Persia and India. They also received some influence from China.

Some Greek mathematical material was actually still in circulation in Europe, such as the geometry Euclid. There were also post-classical figures such as Boethius who introduced various innovations. Knowledge of mathematics also persisted in Europe in architectural circles: none of those fancy European monasteries or castles could have been built without a knowledge of mathematics. The Gothic style particularly owed little to Arabs on its earlier forms. Astronomy also never died out in Europe, but was stunted until the development of telescopes.

Arabs also conquered the southern and eastern halves of the Roman Empire which included some of the best libraries of the ancient west. When it came to scientific manuscripts, the early Muslims would destroy them if they felt they went against the teachings of the Koran. When more liberal rulers came in, there were translations of Greek MSS into Arabic, but these usually included censorship of anything that was perceived as pagan. This was a mixed blessing - on the one hand, it preserved the more scientific aspect of the texts, but removed their cultural context.

Hi Jordan.

I was trying to make a specific point, so yes, I left out a great deal of European mathematical history, just as you left out the contributions of scholars in Constantinople. The line of what to include always gets drawn somewhere.

You brought up some good points.

Algorithm

Okay then, try doing longhand division using Roman or Mayan numerals, if you're up to it.

The Romans never quite figured it out either.

I often had students write code to calculate the dates of Easter, from a written algorithm. It was mostly an exercise in careful reading, with the side benefit that students would also learn a quick and dirty knowledge of how Easter is calculated, and why the Gregorian Calendar was created.

I thought about having them develop an algorithm for Roman numeral addition, without converting to binary to do the add. Just work with the characters, as the Romans did. That seemed just a tad too sadistic. I never even considered RN multiply or divide. Roman numerals have no redeeming social value IMHO. Nothing at all is easier in Roman numerals. Arabic (yes, Hindu) numerals were a vast improvement.

William Law Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Okay then, try doing longhand division using Roman
> or Mayan numerals, if you're up to it.

There are nerds who to this day use Roman numerals for fun. I suppose it is a form of masochism.

Roman numerals are still loosely a decimal system, although that is sometimes hard to see. It requires a lot more mental effort but it is possible.

Also to be fair to the Mayans they also had the concept of zero, and had extremely advanced mathematics, all without the help of super-intellectual Muslims.

As stated above, Arabic numerals are misnamed. They should be called Indian or Hindu numerals. Hindus came up with the system and Muslims tweaked the design.

Imagine the outcry when these folks find out about an addictive drug that kills and injures tens of thousands of people a year in the U.S., and is probably in their house right now!

Alcohol!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Etymology

Yeah, I've always suspected you were an expert on alcohol.

Don't get CZ riled up. He knows what I look like.

Oh, the poor man!

I took a course (required) in undergraduate college in drug studies, and the professor teaching it said the same exact thing. The only real difference between alcohol and other drugs in the U.S. (he said) is how they are defined legally (which means how socially accepted they are).

blindguy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I took a course (required) in undergraduate
> college in drug studies, and the professor
> teaching it said the same exact thing. The only
> real difference between alcohol and other drugs in
> the U.S. (he said) is how they are defined legally
> (which means how socially accepted they are).

He forgot something else. Alcohol is really easy to make. None of the rest are.

Pot is really easy to grow.

Archaeologists: Dangerously close to sober.

That's not fair! I almost shot coffee out of my nose.



But not inaccurate.

;-)

I feel sorry for archaeologists. Their lives are in ruins.

Concrete Zipper Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Imagine the outcry when these folks find out about
> an addictive drug that kills and injures tens of
> thousands of people a year in the U.S., and is
> probably in their house right now!
>
> Alcohol!
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Etymology

Haven't you already tried out Prohibition? How did that go?

Much like America's current War on (some) Drugs, the U.S. prohibition of alcohol in the early twentieth century did not go well. Attempting to legislate morality (and sometimes even mere "good sense") seems to frequently backfire.

As the song says, 'When will they ever learn?".

CZ

Years ago there was a proposal in Texas to teach foreign languages in Texas high schools. One Texas legislator objected: "If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for our Texas schoolchildren!"

RPackham Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Years ago there was a proposal in Texas to teach
> foreign languages in Texas high schools. One Texas
> legislator objected: "If English was good enough
> for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for our Texas
> schoolchildren!"

That quote is actually a variation on a joke that goes back to the 19th century:

"We found that the 'Bible written in English' line is so old it was used to make fun of Texas’ 1925-27 governor, Miriam Ferguson, to whom versions have also been attributed.

"And it’s even older than that, tracing back to at least 1881."

https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2014/feb/12/facebook-posts/bachmann-didnt-say-bible-was-written-english-and-n/



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/2020 03:57AM by lurking in.

This is not all that different from Dallin Oaks' defense of King James English in Mormon prayers and scripture, that he made in a GC address a few years ago.

A phrase in scripture (? which one) was quoted by a GA as being 'the exact words that Jesus spoke'...

O Really?

what about Honesty & Kindness, why are those no longer on the ChurchCo menu?

The state of education in the U.S. is sad. That's why so many are devout church-believers.

The collective stupidity of the flock is astonishing.

"Don't teach my kid Arabic Numbers"

I agree CX%!

Ha!

...and don't get me started on that Roman alphabet.

I agree CX%!

LOL I'd ask them exactly what kind of numbers they wanted their kid to learn.

Why Murican Numerals, of course. Manifest Destiny Math - resistance is futile, prepare to be assimilated.

Manifest Destiny Math only uses the natural numerals and admits no fractions. Everything must be kept simple and positive.

And no strange foreign names like Kareem Al-Jabr!

Or Cassius Clay

Hah!

They should only learn Deseret Digits.

*poof*



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/2020 03:50PM by Lot's Wife.