Hi Andy, and others


Andrew G Williams wrote:
>
> All this talk about finger-counting raises a point that I find confusing:
>
> I've heard many times that we use the base-10 (decimal) number system because
> we have 10 fingers, resulting in 10 digits for the number system - the word
> 'digit' arising from the latin for 'finger'. This doesn't make sense!  As
> zero is signified by no fingers, there should be 10 digits greater than zero,
> but decimal only contains 9.
>
> Did the guy who chose decimal have a finger missing?
>
...

        You are missing a little historical detail here. The truth is that the
first numbering systems didn't have a ZERO. The old civilazations around
Europe and Middle East, like for instance Babilonian, Roman, Celtics and
lots of others didn't used any simbol for zero. They didn't have maths
and the only use for numeric systems was counting (sheeps, horses,
trees, and so on). It were the arabian civilazations on the north of
Africa that created the concept of ZERO and represented it as a figure
together with the other ones (1..9) that we all use today. We still call
it 'arabic numbering' as opposite to 'roman numbering' (with letters
I,V,X...) that can still be found in the dates of old monuments.
        The Arabs are also the first ones to use arithmetics, they created
concepts like adiction/subtraction, product/division, power/root and the
likes. They were in fact the creators of the first calculating technics
(by this time China was a closed culture unknown to the rest of the
world). These calculating technics were latter developed along centuries
in european countries and finally received the actual name of Maths.
        So if you have a problem with Maths, now you know who to blame for it!
:-).


        best regards

        Jorge F (from bettwen Europe and North Africa  KD)