On Hacker News they linked to a story on the recent event where Kasparov played against Turing’s chess algorithm. This was covered in many places, but what I found interesting was the comment section where someone mentions Kasparov’s views on ancient history (and how they are controversial/debunked).
I am not qualified to judge, but I had not seen this aspect of him covered before and thought it was interesting to share.
Thanks for your posting.
I get a chuckle out of those who characterize someone as paranoid especially in chess.
If Kasperov is, I wish I were, at least in my chess game.
In re his writings on History etc. I find his views to be as believable as most historians. Just opinions and speculations.
And lastly even paranoids have enemies.
Gary Kasparov should read the excellent book “From One to Zero” by Georges Ifrahs; Roman mathematics, like Greek, Egyptian, Persian, etc. was largely based on Geometry; they frequently didn’t use numerical calculation, rather they used geometric calculation. Hence the idea that 2 x 2 = 2^2 (2-squared) is called that because the method of calculation was to geometrically construct a square - and the answer was given by counting the number of units within the square - hence 2 x 2 yields 4 1x1 square units - so the answer is 4.
The ancient Babylonians used base 60 arithmetic for some time because it was easy to do division and multiplication. 60 is evenly divisible by many commonly used factors: 1, 2, 3, 4,5, 6, (the first 6 numbers) 10, 12, 15, 20.
It is this use that caused 12 hours in a (half) day, appx 360 days in a year (60x6), 360 degrees in a circle, etc.
The Babylonians also knew how to do base 60 arithmetic on their hands. Hold your right hand palm facing you. Use your right thumb to count each finger segment on your hand. There are 12. Now hold 1 finger up on your other hand. Do this 5 times and you get to 60, all 5 fingers on your left hand used. (You can also use segments on your left hand and count to 144.)
Euclidean geometry and algebra are homomorphic. That’s why this works.
Geometry is how the Romans (and earlier civilizations) got architecture done. A big aspect of Rome’s improvements in architecture was due to better concrete - they discovered that using pumice from Mt. Etna made better concrete.