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Calculus
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==Etymology== {{Wiktionary}} In [[mathematics education]], ''calculus'' is an abbreviation of both [[infinitesimal calculus]] and [[integral calculus]], which denotes courses of elementary [[mathematical analysis]]. In [[Latin]], the word ''calculus'' means “small pebble”, (the [[diminutive]] of ''[[wikt:calx|calx]],'' meaning "stone"), a meaning which still [[Calculus (medicine)|persists in medicine]]. Because such pebbles were used for counting out distances,<ref>See, for example: * {{Cite web|title=History – Were metered taxis busy roaming Imperial Rome?|url=https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/8841/were-metered-taxis-busy-roaming-imperial-rome|access-date=13 February 2022|date=17 June 2020|website=Skeptics Stack Exchange|archive-date=25 May 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120525035132/https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/8841/were-metered-taxis-busy-roaming-imperial-rome|url-status=live}} * {{Cite book|last=Cousineau|first=Phil|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m8lJVgizhbQC&q=Ancient+Roman+taximeter+calculus&pg=PT80|title=Wordcatcher: An Odyssey into the World of Weird and Wonderful Words|year=2010|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=978-1-57344-550-4|oclc=811492876|pages=58|language=en|access-date=15 February 2022|archive-date=1 March 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230301150357/https://books.google.com/books?id=m8lJVgizhbQC&q=Ancient+Roman+taximeter+calculus&pg=PT80|url-status=live}}</ref> tallying votes, and doing [[abacus]] arithmetic, the word came to be the Latin word for ''calculation''. In this sense, it was used in English at least as early as 1672, several years before the publications of Leibniz and Newton, who wrote their mathematical texts in Latin.<ref>{{cite OED|calculus}}</ref> In addition to differential calculus and integral calculus, the term is also used for naming specific methods of computation or theories that imply some sort of computation. Examples of this usage include [[propositional calculus]], [[Ricci calculus]], [[calculus of variations]], [[lambda calculus]], [[sequent calculus]], and [[process calculus]]. Furthermore, the term "calculus" has variously been applied in ethics and philosophy, for such systems as [[Jeremy Bentham|Bentham's]] [[felicific calculus]], and the [[ethical calculus]].
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