Table of Contents
BEST IELTS Academic Reading Test 498
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST 498 – PASSAGE – 1
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST – 498
READING PASSAGE – 1
The Number Zero
An Indian invention
One of the greatest developments in the history of mathematics is based on the concept of nothing. The zero, or as it is sometimes known, nought, is fundamental to calculus, which has made engineering, physics and a great deal of modern technology possible. But where did it start? There is an eighth-century fort on a plateau overlooking the Indian city of Gwalior. It contains a small ninth-century temple which is carved into a solid rock wall. The Chaturbhuj Temple contains an inscription of the number 270, which is the oldest known written example of zero.
The inscription actually contains two instances of zero. The number 270 refers to the size of a piece of land, and 50, which makes reference to a daily gift of fifty garlands of flowers. The zero is easily recognized, it’s the same circle form that we use today. And the 2 and the 7 are also very similar to the Arabic numerals used now, which must mean that they originally came from India.
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Why was India the birthplace of this creation that is so important to the modern world? The idea of zero as empty void is nothing new to Indians, who embrace it as positive state. Yoga was developed to encourage meditation and the clearing of all thought, and both Buddhism and Hinduism include the concept of nothingness in their theology. Zero may have come from the Buddhist philosophy of sunyata or emptiness. Sunya in Sanskrit can refer to zero. Religion and science are often in conflict in the modern world. In ancient India, however, mathematics and mysticism could not be untangled.
The Babylonians, the Chinese and the Mayans may have had a concept of zero as a placeholder, but they did not seem to develop it as a number to be used in other areas of mathematics. In value number systems (where the position of the digit indicates its value) a placeholder indicates the part of a number that has no value. For example, the number 207 means that there are 2 hundreds, no tens and 7 ones.
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Zero is the placeholder that holds the place of the tens. To represent the placeholder, the Babylonians used a marker and the Chinese used a space. The Indians were the first to use the symbol 0, but they also viewed it as a real number like 1 to 9, not only as a placeholder. This was a huge conceptual step in the history of mathematics. India was the only civilization to bring zero to another level.
The reason why the zero was not developed elsewhere is unclear. Greek philosophers toyed with the idea of the void and the physics of motion, but not in terms of mathematics. Both Greek and Roman numerical systems used letters from their alphabets to indicate multiples of ten. Other civilizations, such as the ancient Egyptians, used symbols. There is a theory that other cultures had a negative view of the concept of nothingness. In early Christianity in Europe religious leaders banned the use of zero when the idea of it arrived from the East because of the belief that God created everything from nothing, and a symbol representing nothing was anti-God.
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India has had a long involvement with mathematics. Early mathematicians in India were captivated by long numbers that went well into the trillions. The Greeks never got further than about 10,000. Two Hindu astronomers and mathematicians, Aryabhata and Brahmagupta, respectively born in 476 and 598, are thought to have been the first to use the modern decimal place system and the rules that govern the use of the zero. Gwalior is the site of the first zero written as a circle, but the Bhakshali manuscript, an ancient Indian scroll carbon dated to the third or fourth century, shows a placeholder dot symbol. This is considered the earliest recorded example of the use of zero as a concept.
After its development in India, it took almost a thousand years for the zero to be accepted in Europe. The Italian mathematician Fibonacci, who brought the decimal system to Europe, wrote in 1200 AD, ‘The Indian method surpasses any known way to compute. It is marvellous. They do their computations using the symbol zero and nine figures.’
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This new mathematical form freed mathematicians from tedious calculations, and so they were able to study the general properties of numbers and deal with more complicated problems. Algebra, algorithms (both invented by bin Musa al-Khwarizmi), and calculus (independently conceived by Newton and Leibniz), the three main areas of modern mathematics, are all only made possible with the use of the zero.
What has currently made zero the hero is that it is at the basis of modern computing. Binary code, which is used in all computer technology, is based on a system in which there are only two possible states, off and on, signified by 0 and 1. In the second century BC, a mathematician called Pingala wrote a piece on the patterns of rhythm and sound used in poetry in which he assigned combinations of 0 and 1 to represent all numbers.
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This was the earliest use of the binary system and of course, Pingala was Indian. And modern computing is something India knows a lot about. It is predicted that the city of Bengaluru, which houses nearly half of India’s IT industry, will shortly overtake Silicon Valley in the US to become the largest IT hub on earth. It is only fitting that this great world capital of the new computer age is in India, the home of the zero.
Questions 1-6
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet write
TRUE – if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE – if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN – if there is no information on this
1. Nought is an alternative word in English for zero.
2. The fort in Gwalior was once a centre for mathematical studies.
3. The numbers we use today had their beginnings in the Arab world.
4. Zero probably originated in India because it was already a religious philosophy.
5. The Mayans used a space as a placeholder.
6. Indians were the first to see zero as more than a placeholder.
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Questions 7-10
Choose NO MORE THAN ONE WORD from the passage for each answer.
Mathematical systems
Used to express multiples of 10:
| Indians | Greeks | Romans | Egyptians |
| zero | letters of alphabet | letters of alphabet | (7)……………… |
• The use of the zero was (8)……………… for some time in Europe as the concept of nothing seemed to conflict with Christian beliefs.
• Indian mathematicians could handle them in their (9)……………… but Greek numbers never went higher than 10,000.
• The Bhakshali manuscript contained a zero symbol of a (10)……………… instead of a circle. However, it is still considered to be referring to zero.
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Questions 11-13
Look at the following statements (Questions 11-13) and the list of names below.
Match each statement with the correct name, A-E.
Write the correct letter, A-E.
11. This person came up with an idea that is the basis of computer systems today.
12. This person introduced mathematical zero to Europe.
13. This person was the origin of two major mathematical systems.
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Pioneers in Mathematics
A. Fibonacci
B. bin Musa al-Khwarizmi
C. Newton
D. Leibniz
E. Pingala
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ANSWERS
1. TRUE
2. NOT GIVEN
3. FALSE
4. TRUE
5. NOT GIVEN
6. TRUE
7. SYMBOLS
8. BANNED
9. TRILLIONS
10. DOT
11. E
12. A
13. B
IELTS Academic Reading Test