What role did the stone stick and shell symbols play in the maya empire?

Stones, sticks and shells were the symbols used in the Mayan Empire to represent their mathematical numerals.

answer

explanation

the given equation is

we can rewrite this as:

let

then the equation becomes:

the factors of 8 that sum up to -9 are {-1,-8}

we split the middle term with these factors to obtain,

we factor by grouping to obtain:

apply the zero product property to get:

but