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There is a lateral thinking question which asks: 'If the Romans (1) (have) all the technology
we have today, why would they not have been able to get to the moon?' (2) (we / be) to
think about this logically, we would probably be unable to come up with a satisfactory reason. However, with
lateral thinking, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation. (3) (the Romans / be) as
technologically advanced as we are, they would indeed be stuck here on Earth. Why? Because if, 2,000 years
ago, they (4) (employ) a Roman centurion to count down their Roman space rocket, he
would have started at ten (in Latin, of course), got down to one and then stopped. The Romans had no word for
'zero', so there would have been no 'Lift-off!'
Of course, the truth is that if these hypothetical Romans (5) (have) the number
'zero', it would be impossible for them to have all our technology. If the concept of zero
(6) (develop), we would not have computers today. Modern maths and physics relies
absolutely on there being a numeral to represent nothingness. It may seem obvious to us now that zero
should exist, but many philosophers in the past were very uncomfortable with the idea. The ancient Greeks
tied themselves in logical knots by stating: 'If nothing (7) (be) a number, then it would be
something. And if it (8) (do) become something, then it would no longer be nothing.' If it
(9) (be) for an Indian mathematician called Brahmagupta, who knows what would have
happened? He wrote the earliest known text stating that zero was a number. If he (10) (do),
we might not have set foot on the moon either.
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