Numbers

Now we know that numbers have a special kind of magic

that makes them work in a different way to words.

When you are talking about numbers,

you always know what you are talking about.

All humans use them all around the world,

words and signs that describe groups of things

or groups of anythings,

the answer to “how many?”

no matter what we are talking about.

And numbers have all sorts of uses in human lives,

from counting sheep, to measuring weight and size,

to trading goods and services.

But they can also be great fun to play with in all sorts of different ways,

without having any reason to use them

other than looking for the way they work together,

and the patterns that they make.

Exploring numbers.

But when humans are starting to learn about numbers

it's important for them to know about one thing in particular

that makes them different to words.

Understanding numbers starts with simple things

and the next thing to learn is always based on the thing you learned before.

With words you can learn some and then add bits to what you know,

and it doesn't matter which words you learn first or second.

But with numbers, the order you learn things matters.

If you don't understand the easier thing

you won't be able to understand the next thing you need to learn.

Sometimes people think they aren't good at numbers,

when it is only that they didn't really understand something at the beginning,

so then they can't make sense of any of the things that follow on from it.

But as they get to know numbers better,

and learn different ways that they work together,

they often find out new things about them,

that turn out to be really useful in understanding the world,

and shaping it in all sorts of complicated ways.

Trading nowadays has become much more than counting sheep.

So many things are measured that it can be hard to keep track,

so people find ways to organise and display the numbers

in ways that are easy to understand,

Shops and other businesses keep their money in banks,

and the banks use computers to know all their customers and how much money they have.

People trade without seeing what they are selling,

just numbers on a computer screen.

People bet money on whether something they haven't seen is going to get more or less valuable.

They use patterns in the numbers to guess what is coming.

They look at numbers over time and try to predict the future.

People play at moving shapes of different dimensions through time,

dimensions that can only be imagined.

Now isn't that magic?

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