For the initial invention of the alphabet and its modification by the Greeks, many conflicting theories have been written - D. K. Psychogios, with his book "Words and Numbers," adds yet another one, resorting to the tools of creative scientific and semiotic imagination. He argues that any attempt to interpret the original form and evolution of the Greek writing system must seriously take into account that the Greek alphabet, from its inception, seems to have had 27 points that functioned as letters-digits, in order to satisfy the needs of mathematics. This hypothesis is based on the close relationships between Egyptian and Greek mathematics, contradictions found in the choice and use of letters, archaeological findings, ancient Greek "accounting," and examples of other alphabets or consonant systems that were created (or adapted accordingly) based on the Greek alphabet, in order to serve the needs of mathematics. The conclusion is that the alphabet (writing in general) should not be treated as an autonomous system of symbols, but as a subset of a broader semiotic system that attempts to express human speech as a whole - and this leads to other interesting thoughts about the new extended writing systems made available to us by computers and the Internet.
Useful supplements to this book, for related issues concerning communication and writing, are the works of the same author, "What are the means of communication?" and "Print media: from clay to the network."