Base 60

    Using 60 instead of 10 as for a number notation system would be convenient in situations where space was a major issue since the number of “digits” would represent 60n and not 10n. Additionally, compared to 10, 60 has 3 times as many factors: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30, 60. Though most notably, 60 is divisible by 3, avoiding the common floating point decimal notation of ⅓.  

    In our daily lives, the most apparent use of 60 is in how we tell time: 60 seconds in 1 minute and 60 minutes in 1 hour. 60 is also embedded in geometry concepts, like circles to equilateral triangles. A less obvious place it shows up, perhaps, is its involvement in retirement in Canada. For most Canadians, 60 is the earliest at which you can start receiving CPP payments. It is possibly an apt analogy for those privileged enough to do so, reaching the age of 60 can be viewed as entering the next stage in your life. 

    Something common in Chinese culture which was taught to me by my parents is a method of counting with your fingers that adds up to 60 instead of 10. Using your thumb to point and keep track, your remaining 4 fingers have 3 segments each, or 12 in total. Once you’ve reached the last segment, or 12, you start over from the beginning while incrementing using your other hand, so that when 5 fingers are raised, it represents 60. 

    Perhaps 60 is significant in so many situations involving time and space because of the Babylonian's cultural legacy, revealing their development or their influence on other cultures in the development and advancement of astronomy and timekeeping. 

    According to Conner and Robertson (2000), 60 could have had some relation with the number of days in a year, as 360 is close to 365. A note of interest is that the hexagon inscribed in a circle can be divided into 6 equilateral triangles, the fundamental geometric building block of the Sumerians. Another note of interest is the theory that the Babylonians happened upon two earlier cultures that used base 5 and base 12 and combined the two systems to create a base 60 number system. I find this last point to be particularly interesting since it has a connection to the alternative finger counting technique I mentioned earlier: counting up to 12 on one hand and up to 5 on the other. 

Lamb, E. (2017, September 12). The joy of sexagesimal floating-point arithmetic. Scientific American Blog Network. Retrieved September 11, 2022, from https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/the-joy-of-sexagesimal-floating-point-arithmetic/

O'Connor, J. J., & Robertson, E. F. (2000, December). Babylonian numerals. Maths History. Retrieved September 11, 2022, from https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Babylonian_numerals/