I read that some people think the use of m for slope comes from the French
word "monter" which means to climb.
By the way, before this discussion about using m to designate slope goes on
and on, please note that it has been discussed here and in sci.math
(several times) and as far as I could tell no one really got anywhere with
their "research." We had lots of ideas but no one really had any
authoritative reason why m is used.
The best explanation I've ever heard was from a colleague who told methat
she always told her students that slope used to be spelled "mslope" with
the "m" silent. :-)
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Paul Casillas Email: casipa@clark.edu
Dept. of Mathematics, M.S. #3 Phone: (360) 992-2545
Clark College Fax: (360) 992-2866
Vancouver, WA 98663-3598 "Math - It does a body good."
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