"One thing that particularly interested Plato was the mysticism of numbers. In his Republic (Book VIII) he speaks in an obscure fashion of a certain mystic number, but he does not make clear what this number is. He calls it "the lord of better and worse births"... One theory is that 60, or 12,960,000 is the Platonic number. This number played an important part in the mysticism of the Hindus and the Babylonians, and it is possible that Pythagoras found it on the banks of the Euphrates, if he really studied there, and that he took it with him to Crotona, passing it on to his disciples, who, in turn, told it to Plato and his followers. ...More than any other of his predecessors Plato appreciated the scientific possibilities of geometry... By his teaching he laid the foundation of the science, insisting upon accurate definitions, and logical proof. His opposition to the materialists, who saw in geometry only what was immediately useful to the artisan and the mechanic, is made clear by Plutarch..."