Efficiency of a numeric system must be judge of the context that it is used. Ancient civilizations used base 12 by counting the creases on their fingers on one hand instead of counting the fingers on two hands. It is much more efficient in commerce than the decimal system - what is 1/2 of 12, 1/3 of 12, 1/4 of 12. That is why we still see references to 12 (dozen eggs, inches in feet etc.) They also used it to signify sections of space (zodiac). Why are there 360 degrees in a circle (not 100). I have a hypothesis that when they reference the age of the ancient people in the bible that one must remember that they used base 12 as well as they used a lunar calendar. This means that the age of Methuselah was 114 years - still extremely old but far more reasonable than 969.
I have written elsewhere that colour could reasonable be describe base 256 instead of hex code. For
instance red could be ☻,0,0 instead of ff,00,00
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