Mathrise to mathset (The movement of Math from the East to the West)

                The second part of the documentary now focuses on the further evolution of mathematics from its establishment from different cultures in the ancient world. The first civilization was from the Chinese civilization where they developed the concept of place value system much like similar to what we now use today. The Chinese mathematics flourished because of their fascination with numbers and the attributes such numbers hold. They believed that there are numbers which were lucky and unlucky, numbers associated with the yin and yang, and all beliefs associated with their culture. Mathematics was also employed in the construction of temples such that its structure would comply with the associated attributes of numbers for a bountiful and successful living. Math was also used in not so good dealings such as in the harem of the emperor. Nonetheless their mathematics was able to flourish because the Chinese people incorporated it with their lives making them masters of their own trade.

                The second Civilization which had some of the astounding contributions in math was the Indian civilization. Indians were very much immersed in their religion that they really took their teachings to heart and tried their very best to live their lives in accordance with these beliefs. In India the concept of zero was finally introduced which was able to fill the gap that the past civilizations failed to do. The Indians were not satisfied with just their recognition of zero as a whole number they also used the concept of negative number though its concept is not as clear as to how we understand it today. Their use of the negative numbers was able to revolutionize the quadratic equation developed by the Babylonians by giving two solutions to a number whose square root was taken. Aside from these two perhaps one of the greatest contributions the Indians gave to modern math could be the sine function of an angle and its relation on the sides of a triangle. The Indians were able to come up with a general procedure on how to determine a side of a triangle given an angle opposite to it or adjacent to it. Another important contribution the Indians gave was on the determination on the exact value of pi.

                Lastly, the third civilization featured in the second part of the documentary was the Persian civilization and their mathematics. Persian math was able to spread the use of Hindu-Arabic numeral which was successful because of their extensive trade relations with other civilization. But this was not the highlight of the Persian mathematics; they were able to develop algebra to generalize the problems that the previously mentioned civilizations deal with. This was considered as a breakthrough since it had been used and applied on quadratic formula and explains why such concept works. Another fascination of the Persian is the cubic equations; they tried to scrutinize the mystery behind the cube but to no avail they were not able to clearly establish the ground rules on the inquiry of the cubic equations.  Not until the west discovered and clearly understood it.

                This is now the start of the mathematics of the east, when the east started to trade with the west. Along with the flow of goods, is the flow of gathered knowledge made by the geniuses of the east. Europe was the first one to popularize the use of Hindu-Arabic system displacing the roman numerals they used before. In this age, the society embraced math to the point that it is used as a form of past time by conducting public “debates” pitting thinkers one after the other. The highlight of the European math is the development of the general solution for the cubic equations. This marked the beginning of the new age of math in the west from its development in the east.