Around 1900 B.C., a student in the Sumerian city of Nippur, in what’s now Iraq, copied a multiplication table onto a clay tablet. Some 4,000 years later, that schoolwork survives, as do the student’s ...

In his book The Mathematical Universe, mathematician William Dunham wrote of John Venn’s namesake legacy, the Venn diagram, “No one in the long history of mathematics ever became better known for less ...

IN a recent number of NATURE (June 30) there appeared a review of a book by G. Mannoury on the philosophy of mathematics, and the reviewer emphasised a statement of the author to the effect that the ...

Eric Mack has been a CNET contributor since 2011. Eric and his family live 100% energy and water independent on his off-grid compound in the New Mexico desert. Eric uses his passion for writing about ...

Mathematics in the French Revolution -- Poncelet (and pole and polar) -- Theorems in projective geometry -- Poncelet's traité -- Duality and the duality controversy -- Poncelet and Chasles -- Lambert ...

Sūnya, nulla, ṣifr, zevero, zip and zilch are among the many names of the mathematical concept of nothingness. Historians, journalists and others have variously identified the symbol’s ...