20th-century-danish-historians

"Strictly speaking, Old Babylonian (and, in general, Mesopotamian) mathematics might therefore better be characterized as computation; instead of ‘mathematicians’ we should speak of ‘calculators’ and ‘teachers of calculation’; supra-utilitarian activities represent ‘pure calculation’ rather than ‘pure mathematics.’ The ultimate interest in finding a number is of course also a characteristic of most present-day applications of mathematics; but it remains a feature which distinguishes both the Mesopotamian and the contemporary calculating orientation from the investigation of the properties of mathematical objects which (since the Greeks) constitutes our ideal type of mathematics proper. (Hoyrup 2018)"