topsquark
Senior Member
- Joined
- Aug 27, 2012
- Messages
- 2,269
I'm not sure how to do a search on this.
I was recently looking over a post that mentioned something along the lines of "we didn't used to use symbols for unknowns..." Clearly when "The Elements" were written variables weren't used quite the way we use them now. I think what I'm asking is when did Geometric terminology evolve into more modern Algebraic terminology like "x + 2 = 3, x + 2 - 2 = 3 - 2, etc." to solve problems?
-Dan
I was recently looking over a post that mentioned something along the lines of "we didn't used to use symbols for unknowns..." Clearly when "The Elements" were written variables weren't used quite the way we use them now. I think what I'm asking is when did Geometric terminology evolve into more modern Algebraic terminology like "x + 2 = 3, x + 2 - 2 = 3 - 2, etc." to solve problems?
-Dan