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mk · 4455 days ago · link · · parent · post: AskHubski: What are the top ten most positively influential events in human history?
I'd say it's somewhat rhetorical, but should we say that Calculus was invented or discovered? I'd say 'invented' as it didn't exist beforehand. The same with zero, I think. It's a conceptual tool that didn't pre-exist.
Here's my two cents. I think that zero was invented and calculus was discovered. The whole study of mathematics is essentially defining a set of axioms, then searching for the unobvious but necessary results that naturally follow from the them. Therefore, a number system is invented (I think in this case numbers and how they relate to one another are axiomatic), and everything that follows is discovered. Basically, once we started doing math with the place value system, calculus was inevitable.
I think if the Greeks would have had place value math, then calculus would have been discovered in the time of Archimedes, as he dabbled in limits, but didn't have the right tools to really investigate them extensively.
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- Therefore, a number system is invented (I think in this case numbers and how they relate to one another are axiomatic), and everything that follows is discovered.
I'll buy that. However, you might then say that it was language that was invented, and then numbers were discovered. BTW, nice link there.