The materiality of numbers : emergence and elaboration from prehistory to present / Karenleigh A. Overmann.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Overmann, Karenleigh A. (Karenleigh Anne), 1957- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Numeration--History.

Numeration.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xxv, 416 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Place of Publication:

Cambridge ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press, 2023.

Summary:

This is a book about numbers - what they are as concepts and how and why they originate - as viewed through the material devices used to represent and manipulate them. Fingers, tallies, tokens, and written notations, invented in both ancestral and contemporary societies, explain what numbers are, why they are the way they are, and how we get them. Overmann is the first to explore how material devices contribute to numerical thinking, initially by helping us to visualize and manipulate the perceptual experience of quantity that we share with other species. She explores how and why numbers are conceptualized and then elaborated, as well as the central role that material objects play in both processes. Overmann's volume thus offers a view of numerical cognition that is based on an alternative set of assumptions about numbers, their material component, and the nature of the human mind and thinking.

Contents:

Numbers in a nutshell

Converging perspectives on numbers

The brain in numbers

Bodies and behaviors

Language in numbers

Global and regional patterns

Materiality in numbers

Materiality in cognition

Making quantity tangible and manipulable

Tallies and other devices that accumulate

Interpreting prehistoric artifacts

Devices that accumulate and group

Handwritten notations

The materiality of numbers.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 11 May 2023).

Other Format:

Print version:

ISBN:

9781009361262 (ebook)

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.