"At its higher levels the golden age of Muslim civilization was both an immense scientific success and a exceptional revival of ancient philosophy. These were not its only triumphs... but they eclipse the rest. ...[T]he Saracens ...made the most original contributions [to science]. These, in brief, were nothing less than trigonometry and algebra... In trigonometry the Muslims invented the sine and the tangent. The Greeks had measured an angle only from the chord of the arc it subtended: the sine was half the chord. The Chosranian (...Mohammed Ibn-Musa) published in 820 an algebraic treatise which went as far as quadratic equations: translated into Latin in the sixteenth century, it became a primer for the West. Later, Muslim mathematicians resolved biquadratic equations. Equally distinguished were Islam's mathematical geographers, its astronomical observatories and instruments (in particular the ) and its excellent if still imperfect measurements of and , correcting the flagrant errors of Ptolemy."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Fernand Braudel, A History of Civilizations (1994) p. 80.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/History_of_trigonometry
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
History of trigonometry
begins with the early study of triangles, traced to the , in () and . Trigonometry was also prevalent in Kushite mathematics.
130 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by History of trigonometry →
Related Quotes
"Similarly to the spread of the Indian place-value system, Indian trigonometry came to Europe via the Arab world, for …"
"[I]n 1575 Western Europe had recovered most of the major mathematical works of antiquity now extant. Arabic algebra h…"
"As in the rest of mathematical sciences, so in trigonometry, were the Arabs pupils of the Hindus…"
"Chapter X., which follows, is on the obliquity of the ecliptic... The next, XI., XII. contain spherical geometry and …"
"Euler wrote... Introductio in Analysin infinitorum, 1748, which was intended to serve as an introduction to pure anal…"
"The development of Indian trigonometry, based on sine as against chord of the Greeks was another of 's achievements w…"
"The second part of the book... contains an exposition of the first principles of the theory of complex quantities; hi…"
"The idea of the logarithm probably had its source in the use of... trigonometric formulas that transformed multiplica…"
"We know that the trigonometric sine is not mentioned by Greek mathematicians and astronomers, that it was used in Ind…"
"Isaac Newton... went to school at Grantham and in 1661 came up as a subsizar to Trinity. ...He had not read any mathe…"