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Pythagorean Theorem Found On Clay Tablet 1,000 Years Older Than Pythagoras (www.iflscience.com)

submitted 5 months ago by Zerush@lemmy.ml to c/science@lemmy.ml

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[–] mukt@lemmy.ml 14 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Isn't this common knowledge that the Indians knew the theorem well before Pythagorus?

[–] NanoBookReview@zirk.us 8 points 5 months ago (1 children)

@mukt @Zerush A fair number of people worked out the Pythagorean theorem before Pythagoras existed. For some reason his name stuck for our culture.

[–] mukt@lemmy.ml 1 points 5 months ago

Given what other comments are saying about him (cult leader appropriating works of others), I think the west/europe would do well not to associate themselves with him.

[–] nova_ad_vitum@lemmy.ca 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yes and also I have a hard time believing the builders if the great pyramid didn't understand it in some capacity either. They just didn't have symbolic algebra to express it the way we do .

[–] mukt@lemmy.ml 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

There are mentions of pythagorian triplets in pyramid era Egypt, and in all fairness, ancient Greeks didn't have symbolic algebra either - it is a fairly recent form of expression.

And, as far as I know, ancient Indians were actually writing mathematical expressions in full prose form - word problems et al.