Maths in the Early Islamic World
In Our Time
BBC
4.6 • 9.8K Ratings
🗓️ 16 February 2017
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the flourishing of maths in the early Islamic world, as thinkers from across the region developed ideas in places such as Baghdad's House of Wisdom. Among them were the Persians Omar Khayyam, who worked on equations, and Al-Khwarizmi, latinised as Algoritmi and pictured above, who is credited as one of the fathers of algebra, and the Jewish scholar Al-Samawal, who converted to Islam and worked on mathematical induction. As well as the new ideas, there were many advances drawing on Indian, Babylonian and Greek work and, thanks to the recording or reworking by mathematicians in the Islamic world, that broad range of earlier maths was passed on to western Europe for further study.
With
Colva Roney-Dougal Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Peter Pormann Professor of Classics & Graeco-Arabic Studies at the University of Manchester
And
Jim Al-Khalili Professor of Physics at the University of Surrey
Producer: Simon Tillotson.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the BBC. |
| 0:02.0 | Thanks for downloading this episode of In Our Time. |
| 0:05.0 | There's a reading list to go with it on our website. |
| 0:07.0 | And you can get news about our programs if you follow us on Twitter at BBC In Our Time. |
| 0:12.0 | I hope you enjoyed the programs. |
| 0:14.0 | Hello, mathematics flourished in the early Islamic world from the 8th century onwards. |
| 0:19.0 | Estonishingly versatile minds consumed all they caught from Indian, Greek and Babylonian traditions among others |
| 0:25.0 | and made extraordinary leaps of their own which still affect what children in simple form are taught at school today. |
| 0:31.0 | One, Choirizmi, Al-Qoirizmi, May 7-8-8-8-15 made his reputation for Al-Jibra, a word taken from one of his great books just as algorithm comes from his name, westernised into Latin. |
| 0:43.0 | Another Persian Umakayam, now known for his poetry, solved complex cubic equations. |
| 0:49.0 | They and many others were inspired by new calculations called for by the Quran, by translations radiating from Baghdad under the Abbasid caliphs |
| 0:57.0 | and by the religious duty to seek knowledge. |
| 1:00.0 | We need to discuss maths in the early Islamic world, called the Rounidu Ghul, reader in pure mathematics at the University of St. Andrews, |
| 1:07.0 | Peter Paulman, professor of classics and Greco-Arabic studies at the University of Manchester, |
| 1:12.0 | and Jim Al-Khalili, professor of physics at the University of Surrey. |
| 1:16.0 | Colbert, many mathematical traditions were drawn together in this period. |
| 1:20.0 | Let's start with the Babylonians. What can you tell us about them and what did they offer to this period? |
| 1:24.0 | So first in terms of the location, the Babylonian Empire was centered in modern-day Iraq and neighbouring countries, |
| 1:31.0 | so along the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, so it's in exactly the same place as the locations we're going to be talking about later. |
| 1:37.0 | It's much, much older though, so Babylonian culture started really flourishing about 3000 BC until about 200 BC. |
| 1:45.0 | So it's as far before the death of the prophet as say Chaucer is from us now. |
| 1:51.0 | In terms of what the maths of the Babylonian Empire was, they had an incredibly advanced culture in a very early age. |
... |
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