Assignment 4 2025
Unique #:
Due Date: 31 August 2025
Detailed solutions, explanations, workings
and references.
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, QUESTION 1
1.1
Instrumentalist or toolbox view
Mathematics is a set of skills, rules and procedures used to get correct answers.
Classroom example: Learners practice the long-division steps to divide 684 by 12.
Success is judged by getting the correct quotient after following the rule.
Platonist view
Mathematics is a body of certain, timeless truths that exist independent of people.
Classroom example: Learners explore why the angles in every triangle add to 180
degrees. They do not measure only. They reason that it is always true, no matter the
triangle.
System view
Mathematics is a logical system built from definitions and axioms, linked by proofs.
Classroom example: The class defines a fraction, then proves rules like a⁄b + c⁄b =
(a+c)⁄b using those definitions, and applies the system to new problems.
1.2 One mathematical contribution from each civilisation and its purpose
Babylonian
Contribution: Base-60 place-value number system and tables for computation.
Real-world problem: Precise tracking of time and angles for astronomy and
calendars, and fair land measurement. Base-60 makes many fractions easy to write
and use.
Egyptian
Contribution: Unit-fraction methods and doubling multiplication.
Real-world problem: Sharing bread, grain, or wages fairly and calculating totals for
trade and taxation. Doubling helped them multiply large numbers with simple steps.
African (sub-Saharan)
Contribution: Yoruba base-20 counting system used in markets, with smart naming
like 45 as five before fifty.
Varsity Cube 2025 +27 81 278 3372