Ask the Experts: What is the origin of zero? How did we indicate nothingness before zero?

Interesting article around the concept of zero or nothing and its representation.

"Something is Nothing" or is it "Nothing is Something?"

Brings to mind the argument of the popular media and the uninformed, non-mathematical argument that the Twentieth Century ended and the Twenty First Century began at the stroke of Mid-night between December 31, 1999 and January 1, 2000. Of course we know it was a full year later!

There was no year of the calendar denoted as year "0" but only a point in time marking the end of years BC and the begining of years AD. Start there, as you should and 2000 years later you arrive at December 31, 2000 23:59:59.999 ready to enter the Twenty First Century on January 1, 2001 00:00:00.000000000000001!

"Multum in Parvo" is the motto of the county of Rutland, loosely tanslated by William Shakespeare, esq., as "Much ado about nothing"...

How did the Romans manage without zero (or big numbers)?

They had I, V, X, L, C, D & M for 1, 5, 10, 50, 500 and 1,000 but nothing else.

I just wondered

I have asked the IRS the same question.

Looking at what they gave me, proved beyond a doubt that they don't know.

Wangito.

just got back from Cancun in Mexico - visited Tulum, wasn't able to get to Chichén Itzá; however, the Mayan culture claims the actual development of Zero and due to it's use had what appears to be very accurate star mapping capabilities.

sorry, was in as guest versus my own identification. As I say, the Mayans claim to have a strong idenfication with the concept of zero -

here is another link for a discussion of what was probably a concurrent 'epiphany' by a number of cultures all nearly the same time -

http://math.mohawkcollege.ca/ocma/conf05/Post_Conf05/Abdul_MAYA_MATH.doc

The origin began when my wife introduced me to her mother for the first time . . . .

what is binary?