x the unknown
Anyone who has discovered the wonders of algebra has wondered, "why is x
the letter always used to represent the unknown quantity one wishes to find?"
Or perhaps not that many have wondered. At first one is too busy learning the
actual algebra to think about it and later on the x has been invoked so many
times that it embeds in woodwork too deep to be dug out.
* * *
But what is the origin actually? Is there something inherently mysterious
about x perhaps? After all, it is the beginning of only very few words.
Maybe it's the slanty, chic appearance. It "marks the spot", seeming to keep
at the center of its intersecting lines an important secret. Probably one or
more of these are the reasons, right?
* * *
Actually, no, although, the reasons above may have helped to keep x popular
in this use. But the actual beginning comes, like algebra (from the Arabic
al-jabr, meaning, "the reduction"), from the Islamic world.
The treatise of the philsopher Omar Khayyam (1048-1122) describes solving
for shay, which is Arabic for "the thing". When this learning came
to the Western world via scientific works in Islamic Spain, it was spelled "xay".
For convenience this was gradually reduced to just x.
010802
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