In mathematics, especially in elementary arithmetic, division is an arithmetic operation which is the inverse of multiplication.
Specifically, if c times b equals a, written:
where b is not zero, then a divided by b equals c, written:
For instance,
since
- .
In the above expression, a is called the dividend, b the divisor and c the quotient.
Division by zero (i.e. where the divisor is zero) is not defined.
Read more about this topic: Elementary Arithmetic
Famous quotes containing the word division:
“O, if you raise this house against this house
It will the woefullest division prove
That ever fell upon this cursed earth.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears;
Yet slower yet, oh faintly gentle springs:
List to the heavy part the music bears,
“Woe weeps out her division when she sings.”
Droop herbs and flowers;
Fall grief in showers;
“Our beauties are not ours”:
Oh, I could still,
Like melting snow upon some craggy hill,
Drop, drop, drop, drop,
Since nature’s pride is, now, a withered daffodil.”
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637)
“Major [William] McKinley visited me. He is on a stumping tour.... I criticized the bloody-shirt course of the canvass. It seems to me to be bad “politics,” and of no use.... It is a stale issue. An increasing number of people are interested in good relations with the South.... Two ways are open to succeed in the South: 1. A division of the white voters. 2. Education of the ignorant. Bloody-shirt utterances prevent division.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)