When was coordinate geometry invented

On the x-axis, values to the right are positive and those to the left are negative. On the y-axis, values above the origin are positive and those below are negative. A point's location on the plane is given by two numbers,the first tells where it is on the x-axis and the second which tells where it is on the y-axis. Together, they define a single, unique position on the plane. So in the diagram above, the point A has an x value of 20 and a y value of These are the coordinates of the point A, sometimes referred to as its "rectangular coordinates".

Note that the order is important; the x coordinate is always the first one of the pair. For a more in-depth explanation of the coordinate plane see The Coordinate Plane. For more on the coordinates of a point see Coordinates of a Point. Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Email Address:. Sign me up! Website Powered by WordPress.

Meet Josh Rappaport. Who Invented the Coordinate Plane? April 20, Like this: Like Loading Comments on: "Who Invented the Coordinate Plane? November 23, at PM. Me parece una lectura muy interesante la cual nos explica sobre quien invento el plano de coordenadas como podemos ayar y como lo descubrieron Like Like. Leave a Reply Cancel reply Enter your comment here Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:.

Email required Address never made public. Name required. Search the Blog. Algebra Survival Guide, Second Edition. Includes new page chapter on Advanced Word Problems. PreAlgebra Blastoff! Legend has it that Descartes, who liked to stay in bed until late, was watching a fly on the ceiling from his bed. He wondered how to best describe the fly's location and decided that one of the corners of the ceiling could be used as a reference point.

Imagine the ceiling as a rectangle drawn on a piece of paper: taking the left bottom corner as the reference point, you can specify the location of the fly by measuring how far you need to go in the horizontal direction and how far you need to go in the vertical direction to get to it. These two number are the fly's coordinates. Every pair of coordinates specifies a unique point on the ceiling and every point on the ceiling comes with a unique pair of coordinates.