Ancient Egyptian Math Is Identical To Math Used In Modern Computers (VIDEO)

In 2008 mathematician and author Michael S. Schneider put together this incredible video illustrating how the mathematics used by Ancient Egyptians is identical to that used in computers today.

Initially we shook our heads in confusion when Schneider said this, but it all becomes very clear as he takes you through the process, simply and elegantly demonstrated on his large notepad.

The Ancient Egyptians figured out how to do multiplication without memorizing times tables, and how to do long division without that horrible half box that was the bane of your early childhood.

We took their tricks and built computers with them. WHOA.

WATCH: (via Daily What)

Comments

[westakhen]

09:00 AM on 01/03/2011

... and yet renewing your driver's license at the Giza DMV is like accomplishing the tasks of Hercules.....

[CptKendrick]

07:08 PM on 12/20/2010

Well, DUH!
Anybody whoever saw the movie Stargate knows that the Egyptians were advanced aliens, so it makes total sense that they would think like computers.

[Bedazio]

06:35 PM on 12/20/2010

This Egyptian math is the DEVIL's work.

Obey the constitution!

[John Crane]

12:47 PM on 12/19/2010

"We took their tricks and built computers with them. WHOA. "

Whoa, yourself. You are as easily amazed as you are ill informed. Nobody set out to copy the Egyptians. Both sets of people saw a similar problem and both arrived at a similar solution.

[John Crane]

12:41 PM on 12/19/2010

Math is math. I'll bet that we making beer the same way the ancient Egyptians made beer, too.

[John Crane]

12:43 PM on 12/19/2010

Correction: I'll bet that we make beer...

[mpmc23]

08:39 PM on 12/18/2010

No talk about why it works?! That's where the payoff is, peeps!

Incidentally, my opinion is that it's not "easier" unless you do your business in binary. In that case, it's totally great. So I'll work in binary only, since that's what it's intended for. Don't know binary?... Sorry!

All you need to know is (1) how to write a number's "expanded notation", (10) the distributive property, (11) how to multiply by 10, 100, 1000, etc., which is just adding the correct number zeroes, (100) how to add.

Here's an example (11 times 5) of how the four-step process would work using the standard, modern layout. Once you've done this, you'll see how his method is the exact same thing… with the exception that now you see why it works

{the problem}
1011 * 101
{expanded notation}
= (1000 + 10 + 1) * 101
{distributive property}
= (1000*101) + (10*101) + (1*101)
{easy multiplications}
= 101000 + 1010 + 101
{add}
= 110111

Wow, that is easy, and it's just as easy for larger numbers. If only we worked in binary!

[MohammedAbbasi]

01:46 PM on 12/18/2010

Nah!

[derrickshair]

10:11 PM on 12/17/2010

You mean to tell me that I spent all of that time memorizing timetables and all I needed was to be able to add a few numbers together. What wasted childhood...lol

[elmasto]

07:02 PM on 12/17/2010

This was actually used by the Ethiopians. The BBC reported on it some time back.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nc4yrFXw20Q

[JavaManiac]

01:30 PM on 12/17/2010

That was very cool.

[RayWes]

11:44 AM on 12/17/2010

I really thought that was amazing.

[DocHuff]

10:18 AM on 12/17/2010

This does not surprise me.

Professor Langford discovered a massive stone ring in the sands of Giza, Egypt. Egyptologist Daniel Jackson, a linguistics professor, translated ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs on the ring's coverstones, which read: "A million years into the sky is Ra. Sealed and buried for all time, his Stargate".

Dr.Jackson further discovered that the symbols on the rings are star constellations that are coordinates for a location within space, thereby proving that the ancient Egyptians were in touch with aliens. While some of these aliens had benign intentions, a race known as "Goa'uld" used the stone rings to move slaves from Ancient Egypt to other habitable planets.

It is very possible that this ancient interaction between the aliens and the Egyptians was responsible for the advancement of Egyptian science and mathematics - to the extent that their way of doing mathematics is identical to what is used in modern computers.

[stanblack]

11:12 PM on 12/17/2010

Nice.

[bairesfiesta]

09:18 AM on 12/17/2010

try using this method to multiply a number like 325*124 and it was not so easy. when you start doubling the numbers for 124 they get huge fast.

[brownfrown]

09:56 AM on 12/17/2010

It's actually pretty easy. Doubling is never hard, may just take a second or two. So you write it out, and do the doubling for 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256 (next double is 512 and it's larger than 325, so we don't need to go that far). Now we start with the biggest number 256 and try to add the next biggest number which is 128 - the sum of those is 384, which is once again is too high, so we try the next number. 256 + 64 = 320, good.. now to this 320 add the next biggest number that won't take us over 325 (meaning we have to skip 32, 16, 8).

Basically 325 = 256 + 64 + 4 + 1 --- Now you just look in your table and add the numbers that correspond to those powers of 2. We get 31,744 + 7,936 + 496 + 124 = 40,300

Obviously this may seem like not the fastest way to do it... we all got calculators, right... But it's pretty incredible if you think about it :)

[brownfrown]

11:24 AM on 12/17/2010

The answer may seem messy and difficult, but you have to remember that we are talking about a completely different counting system - the answer to ancient Egyptians would simply be 101000101

[jamalc]

08:49 AM on 12/17/2010

I LOVE math! Especially when performed by Danica McKellar.

[Sara Williams]

08:11 AM on 12/17/2010

Wow, I love guys like this who can put math and science so succinctly without going over the heads of us liberal arts simpletons.

I do some programming, and already I'm seeing how simple it would be to loop those numbers and come up with that math. Building a times table in binary would be beastly.