LESSONS FROM THE ANCIENT WORLD
by Thomas Frey
"During the time of the ancient Greek civilization, several mathematicians became famous for their work. People like Archimedes, Pythagoras, Euclid, Hipparchus, Posidonius and Ptolemy all brought new elements of thinking to society, furthering the field of math, building on the earlier work of Babylonian and Egyptian mathematicians.
A few generations later the Romans became the dominant society on earth, and the one aspect of Roman society that was remarkably absent was the lack of Roman mathematicians. Rest assured, the scholarly members of Roman society came from a good gene pool and they were every bit as gifted and talented as the Greeks. But Roman society was being held hostage by its own systems. One of the primary culprits for the lack of Roman mathematicians was their numbering system – Roman numerals and its lack of numeric positioning.
While it’s easy for us today to look at Roman numerals and say that it was a pretty stupid numbering system, it was just one of many inferior numbering systems in ancient times
. But the feature that made Roman numerals so bad was the fact that each number lacked specific numeric positioning and was in fact an equation, and this extra layer of complexity prevented people from doing higher math.
Roman numerals were a system problem, and a huge one at that. They prevented an entire civilization from furthering the field of math and science.
Romans were so immersed in their numbering system that they had no clue that it was preventing them from doing even rudimentary math such as adding a column of numbers or simple multiplication or division, a feat still handled by abacus. It also prevented them from creating some of the more sophisticated banking and accounting systems and restricted academia from moving forward in areas of science, astronomy, and medicine.
Ratchet forward to today. We live in a society where virtually everything is different from the days of the Roman Empire. But what seems so counterintuitive to most is that we are even more dependent today on our systems than the Romans ever were. Most of these systems we take for granted – systems for weights and measurement, accounting, banking, procurement, traffic management, and food labeling. With each of these systems we are much like the Romans, immersed in the use of these systems to a point where we seldom step back and question the reasoning and logic behind them.
Our systems govern virtually every aspect of our lives. They determine how we live and where we live, what we eat and where we work, where and when we travel, how much money we will make, the job we do, the friends we have, who we marry, and even how long we will live. But much like fish not understanding what water is, we seldom step back to fully understand the context of our existence.
As a starting point, one question we should be asking is, “What systems do we employ today that are the equivalent of Roman numerals, preventing us from doing great things?”
This simple question is very revealing. It has a way of opening a Pandora’s box full of friction points, inefficiencies, and flow restrictors that we contend with every day. Our systems are what control the flow of commerce, govern our effectiveness as members of society, and create much of the stress we face on a daily basis."
What SYSTEM we use either opens up endless possibility or makes things completely invisible
or at worst ==> CONTRARY !
Consider==> A Point and Figure chart keeps the structural dynamics of the market , a dynamic history , on the same basis as the market itself.
Each BOX has correct numeric positioning , each column has correct numeric positioning.
Because everything about the chart is drawn by the COMPOSITE MAN himself.
Most importantly it is DRAWN in his definition of TIME.
How we organize the market determines how we see it. Robin Mesch
Why try and do mathematics with Roman Numerals ?
The top of every column is the top of every column !
The bottom of every column is the bottom of every column !
From HERE is the way ahead !
Motorway
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