“The great appeal of the doctrine that the mind is a blank slate is the simple mathematical fact that zero equals zero” —Steven Pinker
Zero is one of the greatest gifts ever bestowed upon humankind. It is basis for modern day calculus, statistics, financial accounting, and computers.
It is believed that zero originated in three separate places—Mesopotamia, India, and Mesoamerica. In Mesopotamia the first recordings of zero was in 300 BCE. For them, zero was just a placeholder between numerals in a number such as 502 and never had an actual numerical value. Similarly, the Mayans in 350 CE independently began using zero, but just like Mesopotamia it was strictly for place holding (www.mediatinker.com). In 500 CE, Ancient India created the first known actual concept of zero. In 628 CE, the Indian mathematician Brahmagupta wrote the rules of zero in his book Bramhasputha Siddhanta. In this book the rules he alludes to are one, zero doesn't change the value to number when added or subtracted, and two, when zero is multiplied with a number the value becomes nothing (www.xslv.org).
In mathe...
Chasing Zero is a documentary which was meant to both educate the viewer on the prevalence of medical harm as well as to enlighten both the public and health care providers on the preventability of these events (Discovery, 2010). The documentary expounded on the fact each year more people die each year from a preventable medical error than die due to breast cancer, motor vehicle accidents or AIDS (Institute of Medicine, 1999). Medical harm can result from adverse drug events, surgical injuries, wrong-site surgery, suicides, restraint-related injuries, falls, burns, pressure ulcers and mistaken patient identities (Institute of Medicine, 1999). Incidences of medical error have been reported in the media for many years. The most startling revelation in the documentary is how common medical errors are and how preventable they are.
The Blank Slate is based on the idea that the human mind is a blank slate, and that all of it’s structure, everything in the brain comes from socialization, culture, parenting, and experience. Pinker argues that the mind is not a blank slate. That we are born with innate traits.
"Do you remember how electrical currents and 'unseen waves' were laughed at? The knowledge about man is still in its infancy." - Albert Einstein
I did my book critique on And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. Agatha Christie was born on September 5, 1890, in Torquay England. In 1914 she
Nasar, S. (2001).A beautiful mind: the life of mathematical genius and nobel laureate john nash.
Wigner, Eugene P. 1960. The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics. Communications on Pure and Applied Mathematics 13: 1-14.
In the article “how to fall in love with math”, the author Manil Suri is trying to convey how beautiful math truly is. He explains how each time someone says “do the math”, they are often referring to something unexciting such as addition or multiplication. “Many people identify mathematics with just one element: arithmetic”. Most people fail to realize that there is more about mathematics. He states that mathematics is about ideas, ideas that inform our universe and that permeate our universe and beyond, that can surprise and enthrall. Math is an art just like music or panting and we should appreciate it. Suri wants to show that with math, you reach beyond the sky, stars, or the edges of the universe.
the mind is not is a superb point of reasoning that can be applied on many different levels with
After reading the novel, Less Than Zero, by Brett Easton Ellis, I now have an idea what three movies I would recommend for the main character(s) to see. I would recommend the movies I will soon name because they relate to the characters’ lives and the overall storyline of the novel. Less Than Zero by Brett Easton Ellis is about a young man, Clay, coming back to visit his family during his winter break of college one year. During his winter break, in California, he reunites with old friends from high school and discovers their lives are drastically different from what they previously were like. During his visit he becomes entrapped by the drug and party scene that endlessly surrounds his old friends like, Trent and Julian. Clay manages to sound quite monotone as he describes the parties and events that take place during the novel. He regularly snorts cocaine during the novel and partakes in other illegal activities but still possesses a moral compass that we see enacted in one of the last scenes of the novel. As Clay is exposed to the more explicit realities of Trent’s, Julian’s, and other old friends lives we see the harsh and cruel reality of the LA party scene and our able to see the multiple depths of a character like Clay.
negative numbers by “i” a new set of numbers can be formed. These numbers were then
The ancient numeric systems aimed at ascribing to a singular whole number or written symbol (up to a point determined by practical needs). This symbol was a combination of a limited number of signs, produced on the basis of more or less regular laws. (2) Three ancient groups of people: the Babylonians, the Chinese and the Mayas discovered a position principle, that is one of the prerequisites leading to discovering a zero and considering it a number. (3) The first appeared in the Babylonian numeration in the 3rd century BC as a result of overcoming ambiguity in the notation of numbers. The sign for a zero that is the so-called diagonally drafted double nail ( ) indicated, first of all, a lack of units of some "sixty" order. It was also treated as kind of an arithmetic operator, since adding it at the end meant multiplication by "sixty". But neither the Babilonian mathematicians nor astronomers treated zero as a number. A diagonally drafted double nail was conceived of as an empty place, that is a lack of unites of a respective order.
“The human brain is a complex organ with the wonderful power of enabling man to find reasons for continuing to believe whatever it is that he wants to believe.”
“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the universe.” Have you ever heard this quote? This quote is from Albert Einstein who persevered in order to invent many different formulas and equations. Albert Einstein was born as the first child of Hermann and Pauline Einstein who were a Jewish couple in Ulm, Germany on March 14th 1879. In November 1881, his sister Maria was born. He went to school for a while, but skipped grammar school because of the rules. At the age of 15, he left school without a degree, but later he would go back, and in July 1900, he finished his studies. Albert Einstein showed perseverance throughout his childhood when everyone thought he was dumb and also
Zero is where it all begins. The use of zero is well known today. But where did it come from? Everything is created, it does not just show up. The use of zero predates the twenty-first century. It is one of the largest controversies of all time. Present day math and even ancient math would not have been the same without it. Zero was conspicuously absent from most early number systems and all earlier civilizations. So where did it come from? No one knows exactly where and when it was invented, nor who invented it. The origin of zero is controversial. Many believe it was invented around 500 B.C., but each civilization/culture has their own theory.
It is not only in my own writing that my awareness of math has been heightened. While reading articles for classes, on news websites, or blogs, I find myself paying more attention to the flow of the author’s argument. We’ve learned that in proof writing it is important to be clear, concise, and rigorous and the same applies to an argument within a paper. I’ve come to realize that if an author is trying to convince me of their point, then they also need to show me why their point is true or important. In this way, I’ve become more critical of an author’s argument; rather than just believing everything that they write, I more closely evaluate the progression o...