How did the concept of zero originate and why is it important to mathematics?
In: Mathematics
We know that the concept of zero as a placeholder digit has been around for at least 5000 years. There are records from ancient Mesopotamia that use a version of zero in counting to help represent a number (eg 10, 101, 1001).
If you mean how did it originate as a number in & of itself (ie signifying nothing or an empty set), again it’s not known exactly but the concept is at least 1500 years old.
In terms of its importance to maths, hopefully there’s a mathematician on here who can give a more technical answer but in broad the concept of zero is fundamental in maths because every other number, positive & negative, is derived from it and all infinite processes relate to the concept of zero in some way. Look up Robert Kaplan if you want to read about it properly, he wrote a whole book on the idea of zero & why it’s important.
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