In some ancient tribes numbers did not go past three or ten.

If you ever look at the history of math all of it is the notion of applied symbols and meanings.

My question is:

How did math become formulated?

What is math outside of our conciousness that applies meaning and abstract thinking to it?

Does math only have meaning because our conciousness applies meaning to it?

Is math a artificial construction only having meaning with our mortal perceivement?

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Deutschland Das Nationalbewusstsein!

55th Stanza.
Wise in measure should each man be;
but let him not wax too wise;
seldom a heart will sing with joy
if the owner be all too wise.

Havamal~

Today we drink tomorrow we die.

Be weary of the machine so you don't become one yourself.

Hi RunicSage

You're asking questions that have perplexed scholars for a long time. Try googling under philosophy of mathematics for their take on it.

A question, related to your final question, I find myself asking is whether math is created or discovered.

I don't think it is a simple answer; some math is created and has little to no bearing on the physical manefestation of reality whereas other math is discovered: deeper not neccessarily seen aspects of physical reality.

Take conic sections (parabola, hyperbola, ellipses). The Greeks spent a lot of time investigating their properites. Did the Greeks [or other ancient culture in parallel] invent conic sections or did they discover them?

Little did they know that parabolic dishes would be used for satellite receivers and headlights...or maybe they suspected their investigations would later be "useful."

I'm not anti-pure math. I think that whether or not math is "useful" is to the mathematician doing it, like beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Some math is about as "useful" as an abstract painting but the mathematical artist doing his/her math is the same thing.

Little to none of this answers your questions, I know... Sorry...

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peace for all
love for all
bliss for all

...may your journey be graceful...

If anything is possible, then the statement, "anything is possible," is possibly false.

As a language that uses symbols to desingate quantities?

Yes.

Yes.

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-Scott

It is undesirable to believe a proposition when there is no ground whatever for supposing it true. -- Bertrand Russell