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[18] [19] Thus, such a table served a similar purpose to tables of logarithms, which also allow multiplication to be calculated using addition and table lookups. However, the quarter-square method could not be used for division without an additional table of reciprocals (or the knowledge of a sufficiently simple algorithm to generate reciprocals ).
Briggs' first table contained the common logarithms of all integers in the range from 1 to 1000, with a precision of 14 digits. Subsequently, tables with increasing scope were written. These tables listed the values of log 10 x for any number x in a certain range, at a certain precision. Base-10 logarithms were universally used for computation ...
The tables can also be used as a table of Napierian logarithms for positive numbers less than one, using the sine values (Columns 2 and 6) as the argument and the log sine values (Columns 3 and 5) as the resulting logarithm. Reversing the procedure gives anti-logarithms.
Mathematical tables are lists of numbers showing the results of a calculation with varying arguments.Trigonometric tables were used in ancient Greece and India for applications to astronomy and celestial navigation, and continued to be widely used until electronic calculators became cheap and plentiful in the 1970s, in order to simplify and drastically speed up computation.
The 19 degree pages from Napier's 1614 table of logarithms of trigonometric functions Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio. The term Napierian logarithm or Naperian logarithm, named after John Napier, is often used to mean the natural logarithm. Napier did not introduce this natural logarithmic function, although it is named after him.
For example, two numbers can be multiplied just by using a logarithm table and adding. These are often known as logarithmic properties, which are documented in the table below. [2] The first three operations below assume that x = b c and/or y = b d, so that log b (x) = c and log b (y) = d. Derivations also use the log definitions x = b log b (x ...
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Because logarithms were so useful, tables of base-10 logarithms were given in appendices of many textbooks. Mathematical and navigation handbooks included tables of the logarithms of trigonometric functions as well. [6] For the history of such tables, see log table.