Tuesday, March 17, 2020

Thomas Harriot essays

Thomas Harriot essays Thomas Harriot was born in 1560 in Oxford, England. Very little is known about his youth. We do know that he attended Oxford University in 1577. His father was a commoner, but unlikely from the poorest class. Harriot graduated in 1580 as an undergraduate at Oxford from St. Marys Hall. Harriot then went to London where he entered Sir Walter Raleighs service around late 1583. Harriot never published his mathematical work in his lifetime. From manuscripts we know that Harriot engaged in deep studies of optics at Syon by 1597. In July 1601 Harriot discovered the sine law of refraction of light. He studied Alhazens problem and gave a solution which involved considering an equivalent problem, namely the problem of the maximum intercept formed between a circle and a diameter of a chord rotating about a point on a circle. By 1606 he began to study the dispersions of light into colors, and began to develop a theory for the rainbow. He was a mathematician and astronomer who founded the English school of algebra. Fauvel and Goulding described him as the greatest mathematician that Oxford has produced. Still today his achievements are not fully appreciated by most mathematicians. Harriot exhibited the logarithmic spiral as the stereographic projection of a loxodrome on a sphere, which proved to be conformal. With great precision Harriot computed the loxodromes, which are the straight lines on the Mercator map. In order to achieve this precision, Harriot introduced finite difference interpolation. Another part of his work, which he is best known, is his work on algebra. He introduced a simplified notation for algebra and his fundamental research on the theory of equations. Thomas Harriot led a full life. Some of his other studies include chemistry, which he studied for almost a year, but did not make any noteworthy discoveries. Harriot was accused of being an atheist, and ...

Sunday, March 1, 2020

History of Mandarin Chinese

History of Mandarin Chinese Mandarin Chinese is the official language of Mainland China and Taiwan, and its one of the official languages of Singapore and the United Nations. It is the most widely-spoken language in the world. Dialects Mandarin Chinese is sometimes referred to as a â€Å"dialect,† but the distinction between dialects and languages is not always clear. There are many different versions of Chinese spoken throughout China, and these are usually classified as dialects.   There are other Chinese dialects, such as Cantonese, which is spoken in Hong Kong, that are very distinct from Mandarin. However, many of these dialects use Chinese characters for their written form, so that Mandarin speakers and Cantonese speakers (for example) can understand each other through writing, even though the spoken languages are mutually unintelligible. Language Family and Groups Mandarin is part of the Chinese family of languages, which in turn is part of the Sino-Tibetan language group. All Chinese languages are tonal, which means that the way words are pronounced varies their meanings. Mandarin has ​four tones. Other Chinese languages have up to ten distinct tones. The word â€Å"Mandarin† actually has two meanings when referring to language. It can be used to refer to a particular group of languages, or more commonly, as the Beijing dialect that is the standard language of mainland China. The Mandarin group of languages includes standard Mandarin (the official language of mainland China), as well as Jin (or Jin-yu), a language spoken in the central-north region of China and inner Mongolia. Local Names for Mandarin The name â€Å"Mandarin† was first used by the Portuguese to refer to the magistrates of the Imperial Chinese court and the language they spoke. Mandarin is the term used through much of the Western world, but the Chinese themselves refer to the language as æ™ ®Ã©â‚¬Å¡Ã¨ ¯  (pÇ” tÃ… ng hu), å› ½Ã¨ ¯ ­ (guà ³ yÇ”), or è  ¯Ã¨ ¯ ­ (hu yÇ”). æ™ ®Ã©â‚¬Å¡Ã¨ ¯  (pÇ” tÃ… ng hu) literally means â€Å"common language† and is the term used in mainland China. Taiwan uses å› ½Ã¨ ¯ ­ (guà ³ yÇ”) which translates to national language, and Singapore and Malaysia refer to it as è  ¯Ã¨ ¯ ­ (hu yÇ”) which means Chinese language. How Mandarin Became Chinas Official Language Due to its immense geographic size, China has always been a land of many languages and dialects. Mandarin emerged as the language of the ruling class during the latter part of the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644). The capital of China switched from Nanjing to Beijing in the latter part of the Ming Dynasty and remained in Beijing during the Qing Dynasty (1644–1912). Since Mandarin is based on the Beijing dialect, it naturally became the official language of the court. Nonetheless, the large influx of officials from various parts of China meant that many dialects continued to be spoken at the Chinese court. It was not until 1909 that Mandarin became the national language of China, å› ½Ã¨ ¯ ­ ( guà ³ yÇ”). When the Qing Dynasty fell in 1912, the Republic of China maintained Mandarin as the official language. It was renamed æ™ ®Ã©â‚¬Å¡Ã¨ ¯  (pÇ” tÃ… ng hu) in 1955, but Taiwan continues to use the name å› ½Ã¨ ¯ ­ (guà ³ yÇ”). Written Chinese As one of the Chinese languages, Mandarin uses Chinese characters for its writing system. Chinese characters have a history dating back more than two thousand years. The early forms of Chinese characters were pictographs (graphic representations of real objects), but characters became more stylized and came to represent ideas as well as objects. Each Chinese character represents a syllable of the spoken language. Characters represent words, but not every character is used independently. The Chinese writing system is very complex and the most difficult part of learning Mandarin. There are thousands of characters, and they must be memorized and practiced to master the written language. In an attempt to improve literacy, the Chinese government began simplifying characters in the 1950s. These simplified characters are used in mainland China, Singapore, and Malaysia, while Taiwan and Hong Kong still use the traditional characters. Romanization Students of Mandarin  outside of Chinese-speaking countries often use Romanization in place of Chinese characters when first learning the language. Romanization uses the Western (Roman) alphabet to represent the sounds of spoken Mandarin, so it is a bridge between learning the spoken language and beginning the study of Chinese characters. There are many systems of Romanization, but the most popular for teaching materials is Pinyin.