![]() The apparent plural form in English goes back to the Latin neuter plural mathematica ( Cicero), based on the Greek plural ta mathēmatiká ( τὰ μαθηματικά), used by Aristotle (384–322 BC), and meaning roughly "all things mathematical", although it is plausible that English borrowed only the adjective mathematic(al) and formed the noun mathematics anew, after the pattern of physics and metaphysics, which were inherited from Greek. For example, Saint Augustine's warning that Christians should beware of mathematici, meaning astrologers, is sometimes mistranslated as a condemnation of mathematicians. This has resulted in several mistranslations. In Latin, and in English until around 1700, the term mathematics more commonly meant " astrology" (or sometimes " astronomy") rather than "mathematics" the meaning gradually changed to its present one from about 1500 to 1800. Similarly, one of the two main schools of thought in Pythagoreanism was known as the mathēmatikoi (μαθηματικοί)-which at the time meant "learners" rather than "mathematicians" in the modern sense. Its adjective is mathēmatikós ( μαθηματικός), meaning "related to learning" or "studious," which likewise further came to mean "mathematical." In particular, mathēmatikḗ tékhnē ( μαθηματικὴ τέχνη Latin: ars mathematica) meant "the mathematical art." The word for "mathematics" came to have the narrower and more technical meaning "mathematical study" even in Classical times. The word mathematics comes from Ancient Greek máthēma ( μάθημα), meaning "that which is learnt," "what one gets to know," hence also "study" and "science".
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