On: Babylon and the Square Root of 2 (2011)

[joshka]

> Wait, is this supposed to be a secret, ancient Babylonian/Indian method of finding the square root? When I was a child, this is how I was told it was done (by hand).

I'm not sure that I can find that interpretation from the article. Can you tell me more? I saw it more as trying to decode and understand the mindset of a culture far removed by what they left behind.

[perl4ever → joshka]

I was asking if that algorithm was meant to be part of "the mindset of a culture far removed" from the typical reader or not.

You wouldn't know what the author intended, but you would know if you ever heard of how to do square roots by hand.

[joshka → perl4ever]

For me, the intent seems to be clarified by this sentence:

> And our question is: what did they really know about the square root of 2?