Natural Mathematics

Most people are afraid of mathematics. Mathematics is nature. Natural mathematics is about people and things. It is about their surroundings. In many societies, sorting things out and counting things can be done almost without numbers.

What is best is what is closest to nature. Amidst the mantra of big data and sophisticated machinery and complex systems, we humans must seek ways back to the basic, that is, nature.

Henry David Thoreau once said that "Our life is frittered away by detail. An honest man has hardly need to count more than his ten fingers, or in extreme cases he may add his ten toes, and lump the rest. Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!"( Henry David Thoreau, WALDEN: Or, Life in the Woods).


Natural mathematics is about relationships. Our relationships with other human beings, animals, trees, seasons, and other elements of nature.

Source: Cover page of "An Introduction to Aboriginal Mathematics" by John Rudder (1999)