The number ten (10) certainly shows up a lot in popular history and culture. From the Ten Commandments to the Bill of Rights, to popular countdowns like David Letterman's nightly Top Whatevers and launching a space shuttle. Whether demarcating the end or the start of a list, it's popularity and frequent use suggest something more than just cosmic coincidence. And a brief look down at our hands could offer one explanation why.
The number ten (10) is rooted in the use of the base 10, or decimal, system. No, not Dewey's system, he just correlated numbers to particular topics so you wouldn't have to spend more than 10 minutes of your time lost in the library. The base 10 system (for the non-nerds out there) is the means by which we count off ten numbers before indexing over to another decimal place. Perhaps the most popular base counting system understood, if not used, other than the binary, or base 2, system. So basically everything in our daily lives that involves a number is displayed in the base 10, or decimal, system. Bank statements, calendar dates, and phone numbers (how many digits can you choose from when drunk dialing?). Surely you or nobody else ever thinks about it, you shouldn't. But it is one global and historical consistency which has enabled mankind to communicate at least a little more clearly through mathematics.
Set aside democracy, the US government must have also borrowed numeration from the Romans, as well. Look at our most popular, or smallest, dollar bills. $1, $5, $10, and $20 bills. (The $2 Jefferson bill just didn't withstand the test of time, much like the Roman empire.) These numbers correspond pretty much exactly with the classical Roman numerals of I, V, X, and XX. But what makes thee numbers so special? Why would the Romans designate new characters for a quantity of 5 and of 10? And why would the number 10, graphically speaking, resemble two V's connected to each other? Again, it most likely is due to our human anatomy and a case of each I equaling 1 finger and each V equaling 1 hand. Since it you're going to establish a standard, why not pick one that is fairly common to the users, or if it is slowly changing at least it will take thousands of years to occur.
I once visited a Bodies Exhibit, actually a couple times. The controversial exhibits at science centers worldwide whereby a German scientist plasticized (that was the term they used) deceased human remains and presented them in both normal and atypical, artistic displays. The end result was basically like walking through a combination of a wax museum crossed with an anatomy book. Anyway, I happened to notice when staring at the entrails of one subject that their hands and feet looked a bit crowded with digits. Sure enough, after counting, this person displayed 6 fingers on each hand as well as 6 toes on each foot. It wasn't advertised to the public, and I later found out that visitors who paid extra for guided headset tours got the tip, so it was probably one of several biological oddities on display that day. Much like Lyle Lovett's face (why that poor man's face is the universal symbol of eh, I don't know, I'm just sticking with it).
So with ten minutes to spare until dinner (my girlfriend honestly just announced that), let me conclude that I'm thankful for the convenience and use of a common base system worldwide (10 or otherwise). I think trying to explain, or use, any other base system would definitely inhibit our ability to communicate and evolve as a "middle class" society. And the slower we evolve physically (rumor has it one day our pinky fingers and toes will cease to exist) the longer we have to morally, politically, humorously, and scientifically evolve. Or at least eclipse the Romans.
