Hippasus of Metapontum, born circa 500 B.C. in Magna Graecia, was a Greekphilosopher. He is the disciple of Pythagoras to whom is attributed the discovery that the square root of 2 is irrational. After the number was revealed to be irrational, the Pythagoreans killed Hippasus, not wishing to believe this fundamental number could be infinitely long and nonrepeating. Magna Graecia (Latin for Greater Greece, Megalê Hellas/Μεγάλη Ελλάς in Greek) is the name of an area in ancient southern Italy and Sicily that was colonised by ancient Greek settlers in the 8th century BCE. Originally, Magna Graecia was the name used by the Romans to describe the greater... The word Greek has a number of meanings relating to Greece, including: Architecture of Ancient Greece Art in Ancient Greece Greek alphabet Greek colonies Cuisine of Greece Greek salad Ethnic Greek Greco-Turkish relations Greece The Greek People Greek-Americans History of Greece History of Mycenaean Greece History of Ancient... A philosopher is a person devoted to studying and producing results in philosophy. ... Pythagoras (582 BC – 496 BC, Greek: Πυθαγόρας) was an Ionian mathematician and philosopher, known best for formulating the Pythagorean theorem. ... In mathematics, the principal square root of a non-negative real number is denoted and represents the non-negative real number whose square (the result of multiplying the number by itself) is . ... 2 (two) is the natural number following 1 and preceding 3. ... In mathematics, an irrational number is any real number that is not a rational number, i. ... The Pythagoreans were an Hellenic organization of astronomers, musicians, mathematicians, and philosophers; who believed that all things are, essentially, numeric. ... Infinity is a word carrying a number of different meanings in mathematics, philosophy, theology and everyday life. ...
He was also noted as an early experimenter in acoustics and resonance. Few of his original works now survive. Acoustics is a branch of physics and is the study of sound, mechanical waves in gases, liquids, and solids. ... This article is about resonance in physics. ...
The largest isosceles triangle of the sriyantra design used in ancient India, described in the Atharva-Veda (circa 1200-900 BC) is one of the face triangles of the Great Pyramid in miniature, showing almost exactly the same relationship between π and the golden ratio as in its larger counterpart.
The ancient Greeks usually attributed its discovery to Pythagoras (or to the Pythagoreans, notably Theodorus) or to Hippasus of Metapontum.
Hellenistic mathematician Euclid spoke of the "golden mean" this way, "a straight line is said to have been cut in extreme and mean ratio when, as the whole line is to the greater segment, so is the greater to the lesser".
The earliest known use of irrational numbers was in the Indian Sulba Sutras composed between 800-500 BC.
The first existence proofs of irrational numbers is usually attributed to Pythagoras, more specifically to the PythagoreanHippasus of Metapontum, who produced a (most likely geometrical) proof of the irrationality of the square root of 2.
The story goes that Hippasus discovered irrational numbers when trying to represent the square root of 2 as a fraction.
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