The roots of the word "algorithm": The word "algorithm" goes back a long way. All the way back to the Abbasid caliphate 12 centuries ago, as a matter of fact. The word comes from the name Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi (which in its Latin version became "algoritmi"), a mathematician born around 780 in what is today Uzbekistan and who died in Baghdad around 850. Because of him, the West learned algebra.