Arithmetic

Our numbering system is of central importance in the subject of arithmetic. The system we use today called the Hindu-Arabic system, was developed by the Hindu civilization of India some 1,500 years ago. It was brought to Europe during the middle ages by the Arabs and fully replaced the Roman numeral system during the seventeenth century.

The Hindu-Arabic system is called a decimal system because it is based on the number 10. This means that it uses 10 distinct symbols to represent numbers. The fact that 10 is used is not important because it could have just as easily been based on another number of symbols like 14. An important feature of our system is that it is a positional system. This means that the number 532 is different from the number 325 or 253. Critical to the invention of a positional system is perhaps the most significant feature of our system: a symbol for zero. Note that zero is a number just as any other and we can perform arithmetic operations with it.