Talk:Algebra

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Stop misappropriating facts and history. The Arabs did nothing more than translate and preserve texts and did not add a line to the body of already known mathematical theories. Basic roots of Algebra can be traced to Diophantus and Theon and Algebra is derived from the word Algorithms, it is so obvious. Plus the alphabet is used for the equations and not the Arabic script.

Now, after the acceptance of the finding of the two Greek mathematicians and the publication, after a crisis, in one of the strictest journals in the field, in the Japanese SCIAMVS (14, 2013 41-57), we can say that now they will probably be traced to different direction the basic roots of Algebra. Diophantus and Theon point in this direction. 2A02:85F:F80C:D100:9C0:4C78:DDF4:7AC1 (talk) 11:54, 8 June 2024 (UTC)


 * Umm... can you clarify what does that means? I cannot comprehend your words. Dedhert.Jr (talk) 13:27, 8 June 2024 (UTC)
 * nothing more than translate and preserve texts – this is directly contradicted by your cited source, which (in the one relevant half-sentence) describes the flourishing of algebra in the Islamic world. –jacobolus (t) 23:20, 8 June 2024 (UTC)
 * The IP seems to suggest that the Arabs did not make any significant contribution to algebra. This goes against what the sources in our article say and, as jacobolus has pointed out, is not even supported by the source they refer to. Phlsph7 (talk) 07:51, 9 June 2024 (UTC)
 * For what it's worth, there are some other point of confusion here. The word algorithm comes from the name Al-Khwārizmī. The word algebra comes from Al-Khwārizmī's book Al-Jabr (al-Kitāb al-Mukhtaṣar fī Ḥisāb al-Jabr wal-Muqābalah) which was translated into Latin as Liber Algebrae et Almucabola. What we call "algebra" today, i.e. pushing alphabetic symbols around using mathematical notation, is formally quite different than the kind of algebra from Theon or Al-Khwārizmī. The solution steps may be conceptually the same, but modern conventions for labeling variable quantities, writing equations, etc. developed starting in the 16th century. –jacobolus (t) 17:22, 9 June 2024 (UTC)