Zero

0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. Adding (or subtracting) 0 to any number leaves that number unchanged; in mathematical terminology, 0 is the additive identity of the integers, rational numbers, real numbers, and complex numbers, as well as other algebraic structures. Multiplying any number by 0 results in 0, and consequently dividing by 0 is generally considered to be undefined in arithmetic.

Quotes

• Zero conflicted with the fundamental philosophical beliefs of the west, for contained within zero are two ideas that were poisonous to western doctrine. Indeed, these concepts would eventually destroy Aristotelian philosophy after its long reign. These dangerous ideas were the void and the infinite.
  • Charles Seife, Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea (2000) Viking Adult, p. 39

• The Babylonians invented it, the Greeks banned it, the Hindus worshiped it, and the Church used it to fend off heretics. Now it threatens the foundations of modern physics. For centuries the power of zero savored of the demonic; once harnessed, it became the most important tool in mathematics. For zero, infinity's twin, is not like other numbers. It is both nothing and everything.
  • Charles Seife, Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea (2000) Viking Adult, p. n1

• The importance of the creation of the zero mark can never be exaggerated. This giving to airy nothing, not merely a local habitation and a name, a picture, a symbol but helpful power, is the characteristic of the Hindu race from whence it sprang. It is like coining the Nirvana into dynamos. No single mathematical creation has been more potent for the general on-go of intelligence and power.’
  • G.B. Halsted, On the Foundation and Technique of Arithmetic, p. 20, Chicago, 1912, quoted in History of Hindu Mathematics, B. Datta and A.N. Singh, 1935.

• He sometimes spoke of "zero" as the symbol of the absolute (Nirguna Brahman) of the extreme monistic school of Hindu philosophy, that is, the reality to which no qualities can be attributed, which cannot be defined or described by words and which is completely beyond the reach of the human mind. According to Ramanujan the appropriate symbol was the number "zero" which is the absolute negation of all attributes.
  • Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis, on ideas of Srinivasa Ramanujan, as quoted in Crippled Minds: An Exploration Into Colonial Culture (1982) by Susantha Goontilake, p. 317

• My confidence in our shared future is grounded in my respect for India’s treasured past—a civilization that has been shaping the world for thousands of years. Indians unlocked the intricacies of the human body and the vastness of our universe. And it is no exaggeration to say that our information age is rooted in Indian innovations—including the number zero.
  • Barack Obama. Quoted from Gewali, Salil (2013). Great Minds on India. New Delhi: Penguin Random House.