The square root of a negative number could easily be regarded as a curious mathematical construction that has little bearing on real life. Indeed, the French polymath René Descartes gave such numbers ...

§RU.1 IN MY PRIMER ON THE SOLUTION of the general cubic, I mentioned the cube roots of 1 (§CQ.4). There are three of these little devils. Obviously 1 itself is a cube root of 1, since 1×1×1 = 1. The ...

Have you ever sat in a math classroom and wondered, “When will I ever use this?” You might have asked yourself this question when you first encountered “imaginary” numbers, and with good reason: What ...

If you’ve ever taken an algebra or physics class, then you’ve met a parabola, the simple curve that can model how a ball flies through the air. The most important part of a parabola is the vertex — ...