Islamic accounting and algebra

In the Qur’an, the word "account" (Arabic: hesab) is used in its generic sense, relating to one's obligation to account to God on all matters pertaining to human endeavour. According to the Qur’an, followers are required to keep records of their indebtedness (Sura 2, ayah 282), thus Islam thus provides general approval and guidelines for the recording and reporting of transactions.[19]

The Islamic law of inheritance (Sura 4, ayah 11) defines exactly how the estate is calculated after death of an individual. The power of testamentary disposition is basically limited to one-third of the net estate (i.e. the assets remaining after the payment of funeral expenses and debts), providing for every member of the family by allotting fixed shares not only to wives and children, but also to father and mothers.[20] The complexity of this law served as an impetus behind the development of algebra (Arabic: al-jabr) by the Persian mathematician Muhammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī and other medieval Islamic mathematicians. Khwārizmī's "The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing" (Arabic: Hisab al-jabr w’al-muqabala, Baghdad, c. 825) devoted a chapter on the solution to the Islamic law of inheritance using linear equations.[21] In the 12th century, Latin translations of al-Khwārizmī's "Book of Addition and Subtraction According to the Hindu Calculation" (Arabic:Kitāb al-Jamʿ wa-l-tafrīq bi-ḥisāb al-Hind) on the use of Indian numerals, introduced the decimal positional number system to the Western world.[22]

The development of mathematics and accounting was intertwined during the Renaissance. Mathematics was in the midst of a period of significant development in the late 15th century. Hindu-Arabic numerals and algebra were introduced to Europe from Arab mathematics at the end of the 10th century by the Benedictine monk Gerbert of Aurillac, but it was only after Leonardo Pisano (also known as Fibonacci) put commercial arithmetic, Hindu-Arabic numerals, and the rules of algebra together in his Liber Abaci in 1202 that Hindu-Arabic numerals became widely used in Italy.[23]
[edit] Luca Pacioli and double-entry bookkeeping
Main articles: Luca Pacioli and Double-entry bookkeeping system

Bartering was the dominant practice for traveling merchants during the Middle Ages. When medieval Europe moved to a monetary economy in the 13th century, sedentary merchants depended on bookkeeping to oversee multiple simultaneous transactions financed by bank loans. One important breakthrough took place around that time: the introduction of double-entry bookkeeping,[24] which is defined as any bookkeeping system in which there was a debit and credit entry for each transaction, or for which the majority of transactions were intended to be of this form.[25] The historical origin of the use of the words ‘debit’ and ‘credit’ in accounting goes back to the days of single-entry bookkeeping in which the chief objective was to keep track of amounts owed by customers (debtors) and amounts owed to creditors. ‘Debit,’ is Latin for ‘he owes’ and ‘credit’ Latin for ‘he trusts’.[26]

The earliest extant evidence of full double-entry bookkeeping is the Farolfi ledger of 1299-1300.[24] Giovanno Farolfi & Company were a firm of Florentine merchants whose head office was in Nîmes who also acted as moneylenders to Archbishop of Arles, their most important customer.[27] The oldest discovered record of a complete double-entry system is the Messari (Italian: Treasurer's) accounts of the city of Genoa in 1340. The Messari accounts contain debits and credits journalised in a bilateral form, and contains balances carried forward from the preceding year, and therefore enjoy general recognition as a double-entry

Definition of Business Studies?Business Studies is defined at the top of the article as "Business Studies, the study of the management of individuals to maintain collective productivity..."

This definition disagrees with both the Business Studies article and my experience, in the fact that Business Studies does not soley study the management of individuals, but also accounting, economics, logistics, marketing, and the management of factors other than people.

The definition in the article could be true for the US, but in the UK at least Business Studies is seen as a broad degree covering all aspects of studying the corporation. Management Studies, a separate institution, fits the definition better, although Management Studies still isn't as specific as the definition, as it also includes management of factors other than managing individuals (e.g. managing resources) AshHartwell (talk) 12:15, 21 August 2009 (UTC)
[edit] Wall Street is a Symbol of Business?

One of the images has the following caption: "Wall Street, Manhattan is the location of the New York Stock Exchange and is often used as a symbol for the world of business."

Isn't Wall Street a symbol of finance, not business?

Wouldn't Main Street be the symbol of business?

Business is selling goods and services. Finance is specifically business between borrowers and lenders.

--Knowledge-is-power (talk) 11:45, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] "gay bashing"

Can someone please that gay bashing textbox they put under "Public Limited Company" I couldn't find a way to get rid of it.

--User: AlphaXIII 09:40, 08 Feb 2007 (UTC)
[edit] "business itself is an evil"

I do not understand the purpose of the quote "business is in itself an evil" is included in this article. It appears to be representative of a narrow point of view, one with which many people would disagree, and adds nothing to the readers understanding. Perhaps it should be removed?

--Socs 11:35, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

    I think its acceptable as a quote. You can feel free to ad a pro-business quote to balance it, since it is obviously an anti-business quote. Sam [Spade] 13:14, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The quote I added is intended to be pro-business, even though it does not explicitly mention business. I thought that it was acceptable since the article gives business a very broad meaning, one containing almost all economic activity. My point is that such activity, or business, is beneficial to all.

--Socs 22:26, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I am removing the quote. I can't think of any encyclopedia article on a topic that then has a quotation saying that the topic is evil. You can create a "criticisms of business" section if you would like, but the quote has no context and no value on uts own. --Goodoldpolonius2 04:55, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

machikne randi ko choro, valu besya, machikne
[edit] I have removed:

RECENT EVENTS

Since 2002, the global step of reduction of costs and optimization of resources became a legal constraint, an obligation for all the highly-rated corporations or unquoted in the stock exchange.

Everything began with the law SARBANNES-OXLEY in the United States in 2002 who returned compulsory internal control. From 2003, Canada and European Economic Community took measures aiming at identical objectives.

See :

* Internal control * Integration of the internal control

This looks like it belongs in a different article: Maybe cost management or corporate governance. mydogategodshat 06:16, 21 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Describing everything in terms of "corporations" rather than companies is very US English. Here corporation tends to be a quasi government body like the BBC (C=corporation), or the local council bin collectors. Does anyone mind if we put in the English English version? Also I think limited liability is a big enough concept to be in this article?(talk)--BozMo 21:14, 9 May 2004 (UTC)

    The only place I see the word corporation is in the legal paragraph where the three forms of business enterprise are mentioned. I have added "also called limited liability company" beside the word "corporation" to make it clear to Brits. Your comment about adding material on limited liability poses a question that we are always asking when writing umbrella articles like this one. As a general rule we try to keep the material broad in scope but shallow in depth. A person looking for in-depth info would go to more specific articles. An umbrella article like this one would get far too long and unfocused if we dealt with every important topic within its scope. The fact that you ask whether limited liability is "a big enough concept" tells me that you understand what I am saying. We can look at some other articles for comparison. The umbrella articles finance and marketing follow the same format as this one. Economics, on the other hand has evolved into a much longer article that summarizes many of the concepts used in that field. Which is best? I don't know. Should you add limited liability material to this one? I don't know that either. mydogategodshat 05:00, 10 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Categories

If anyone is interested, I could use some help with the business category. About 150 articles are in the main category. Most of them already have subcategories. I'm working on deleting them from the main category. Maurreen 08:43, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Portal

There is a new portal. See Wikipedia:Wikiportal/Business, Economics, Finance. Maurreen 03:36, 18 July 2005 (UTC)
[edit] 1.0 core topics COTF

This article was the core topics COTF from 15 May till 1 June 2006. Walkerma 04:46, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Organization

I just made some revisions to the Organization section of this article. Looking at it, that whole section would be better if replaced by (or at least supplemented with) a wire-diagram of a generic organizational structure. Anyone have such an image handy? Rossami (talk) 23:46, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
[edit] A different approach

I have been watching the 1.0 collabortions because I think they are importnat topics that really need work, but have yet seen anything I could easily help with. I was wondering if anyone has ever tried to build these sorts of articles backwards. By identifing what should be the daughter articles and intergrating information from them (if they are in any better shape) into the larger one. I really am not sure how this article should be organized or I would try and start this but I imagine the the subsections (and therefore dauther articles) might include Economics, Trade, Industry, Profession, Corporate finance, Accounting, Intellectual property, Marketing and Corporation. I have tried to substitute articles with decent information for ones that might seem beter suited but have little info (Trade for Commerce). What does everyone think of this approach or how it should be organized?--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 13:58, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

    Definitely, yes! This is in fact the approach that was used recently with Humanities, another very broad topic (these are the hardest to write!). It was also used in our first collaboration, to take Antarctica from Start-Class up to featured article standard. Business may no longer be officially the COTF, but that doesn't mean we don't want to see the article improve. As you say, you summarize a topic like finance then use the "main" template (as {{Main|Trade}}to link to the main article. If I knew more about business I would help you do this! Thanks, Walkerma 04:57, 1 June 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Types of business

This last edit is too UK specific. And factually incorrect. You also have limited partnership etc., in the UK. I suggest we delete or rewrite it. Poweroid 14:34, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

    Just reverted another UK specific company type list. A discourse on business/corporate entities across all countries would be very, very valuable, but the last attempt had two problems:

       1. It was a word per word cut & paste from a commercial site.
       2. It mixed entities types across the two countries without discerning which was applicable where - making it fairly useless as a reference.

    Would be delighted start fashioning such a list; but let's start it on the talk page and dod it with reliable sources. Kuru talk 21:30, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Need a link

We really need a link to Business mediator here, but I have absolutely no idea where to put it. Suggestions please? (Note: If this request has been here for more than a day, there is a chance I won't reply unless notified on my talk page.) Yuser31415 04:34, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I think it should go under the section "See Also" -- Zragon 09:31, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
[edit] No sources

I noticed this article doesn't have any sources.

    * Definition from Merriam-Webster [1]

   1. archaic : purposeful activity : busyness
   2. a: role or function <how the human mind went about its business of learning — H. A. Overstreet> b: an immediate task or objective : mission <what is your business here> c: a particular field of endeavor <the best in the business>
   3. a: a usually commercial or mercantile activity engaged in as a means of livelihood : trade or line <in the restaurant business> b: a commercial or sometimes an industrial enterprise; also : such enterprises <the business district> c: dealings or transactions especially of an economic nature : patronage <took their business elsewhere>
   4. a: affair or matter <the whole business got out of hand> <business as usual>
   5.  : creation or concoction
   6.  : movement or action (as lighting a cigarette) by an actor intended especially to establish atmosphere, reveal character, or explain a situation —called also stage business
   7. a: personal concern <none of your business> b: right <you have no business speaking to me that way>
   8. a: serious activity requiring time and effort and usually the avoidance of distractions <got down to business> b: maximum effort
   9. a: a damaging assault b: rebuke tongue-lashing c: double cross
  10.  : a bowel movement —used especially of pets

synonyms: business, commerce, trade, industry, traffic mean activity concerned with the supplying and distribution of commodities. business may be an inclusive term but specifically designates the activities of those engaged in the purchase or sale of commodities or in related financial transactions. commerce and trade imply the exchange and transportation of commodities. industry applies to the producing of commodities, especially by manufacturing or processing, usually on a large scale. traffic applies to the operation and functioning of public carriers of goods and persons. See in addition work.

    * Etymology "O.E. bisignisse (Northumbrian) "care, anxiety," from bisig "careful, anxious, busy, occupied" (see busy) + -ness. Sense of "work, occupation" is first recorded 1387. Sense of "trade, commercial engagements" is first attested 1727. Modern two-syllable pronunciation is 17c. Business card first attested 1840." [2]

Legal business structure[3] isn't the same as "business". In the US, "a trade or business is generally an activity carried on for a livelihood or in good faith to make a profit." [4] Business can refer to an enterprise such as a specific bakery or oil company -- or to any purposeful (usually commercial) activity of an individual or group. It might be helpful if this article covered the topic in a more general way, since it's an introductory article. --65.78.212.190 (talk) 19:08, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

    I found that stuff when I wasn't logged in, thus the anon signature. Do you think this article should be more general, or do you agree that it should just be about US legal definition? Comments? --Foggy Morning (talk) 02:09, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 'their acceptance of risk' means what?

While trying to find out what the objectives of businesses are, I found "the receipt or generation of a financial return in exchange for their work and their acceptance of risk" Does "their acceptance of risk" mean "accept the risk that they can deliver said work for a cost that is less than their price" ? 81.6.250.44 (talk) 12:50, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

    Probably also plus the risk that the price won't be paid (nonpayment), plus inflationary risk. --65.78.212.113 (talk) 02:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Focus of the article

The focus of this article should not be only economics. Economics is one of a number of subtopics of business listed under Basic business concepts. This article should be more or less reflective of Topical outline of business. Please revise the article accordingly. The rest of the meanings for business can be listed at Business (disambiguation). Bebestbe (talk) 18:55, 18 June 2008 (UTC)
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system.[28]