The symbols we use every day have fascinating and surprisingly recent origins, explains author Joseph Mazur in his new book A few years ago friends and I were talking about the origins of written ...

Diagram 1: This diagram shows all squares on the chessboard identified by their coordinates. You would notice along the sides of the board there are letters and numbers. They are used to identify ...

David E. Dunning explores how mathematical notation is a social, world-building technology. It’s natural to think of math as being fundamentally abstract. Whether it’s invented or discovered, its ...

Algebra uses letters to represent unknown values. Unknown values are commonly represented by the letters x and y. There are several principles you need to know to be able to use algebraic notation.

WITH reference to Mr. Davison's letter in NATURE (vol. xxxiv. p. 571), I wish to point out that the subject of algebraic notation, not only for kinship, but for kinship and affinity, has been pretty ...