algebra

UK/ˈæl.dʒɪ.bɹə/US/ˈæl.d͡ʒɪ.bɹə/

nounB2+Common in everyday speech and writing · #6,285 of 15,258leans written

Other forms: algebras

Algebra is the mathematics where letters stand in for unknown numbers. Do algebra, an algebra problem, basic algebra.

Replacing a number with a letter is what lets one statement cover every case, which is the whole power of the thing: x plus two equals five is a question, and the rules for moving terms about are how you answer it. It is usually the first mathematics that feels abstract, and the point where many people decide the subject is not for them. Note algebraic; and linear algebra, which is a large field of its own.

Definitions of algebra

1nounalgebraThe mathematics where letters stand in for unknown numbers.B2+
“In algebra class, we learned how to find the value of x in simple equations.”

algebra is a branch of mathematics.

Where it comes from

Medieval Latin took it from Arabic al-jabr, the restoring of broken parts, in the title of al-Khwarizmi's ninth-century book on solving equations. His own name gave us algorithm, so one scholar named two of the foundations of computing.

Medieval Latin
algebra
English, today
algebra

Borrowed from Medieval Latin algebra. Medieval Latin algebra, from the Arabic جبر (“reunion, resetting of broken parts”) in the title of al-Khwarizmi's influential work الْكِتَاب الْمُخْتَصَر فِي حِسَاب الْجَبْر وَالْمُقَابَلَة (“The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Science & Space

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algebra in the wild

The theory of real Banach algebras can be very different from the theory of complex Banach algebras.
Banach algebra
Another active area of research is the program to obtain classification, or to determine the extent of which classification is possible, for separable simple nuclear C*-algebras.
C*-algebra
Computer algebra systems may be divided into two classes: specialized and general-purpose.
Computer algebra system
General-purpose computer algebra systems aim to be useful to a user working in any scientific field that requires manipulation of mathematical expressions.
Computer algebra system
In mathematics, an algebra over a field (often simply called an algebra) is a vector space equipped with a bilinear product.
Algebra over a field

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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