[DiscourseFan]

I haven't read this book, but the earliest written signs we have are pictographic, and don't seem to have a relation to numbers per se, but are much closer in character to ancient cave drawings. The argument is interesting from the perspective of numeracy as ancient Egyptian magical stories often involved numerical quantities, the Tao Te Ching is another example of magic involved with numbers, but I think that would come from a later period of development of civilization, whereas the origins of writing itself probably predate something like an advanced agrarian economy such as Egypt, China, the Indus River Valley civilization and the Mayan civilization.