system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Why are there so many alphabets (+350), but so few numeral systems?
gpt
I think the best analogy is that of Survival of the Fittest.

All of the modern alphabets or writing systems are essentially equally good at transcribing the spoken word. That's all a writing system needs to do: transcribe spoken words well enough, and not be too onerous to write or read. Some writing systems may have more characters, while others may rely on digraphs for certain sounds, some may work well carved in stone while others look more beautiful written with a brush, but they all basically get the job done.

A numeral system has more constrains: it not only needs to be able to represent small numbers that we can count on our fingers, but, at least in the past couple thousand years, it needs to be able to represent very large numbers, and be able to be used in mathematics.

While all sorts of numeral systems can do the very first (representing small numbers), fewer could do the second (representing large numbers) but absolutely none could beat the Hindu–Arabic numeral system in terms of its power at doing all three.

The invention of both zero and a positional notation (the same ten symbols, meaning different things depending on where they are placed) was so simple and powerful that it blew away all the earlier systems (including nearly-similar ones used by both the Babylonians and the Greeks, which were not as simple or powerful).

The Hindu–Arabic numeral system was simply objectively better than any other co-existing system, and so the other systems were just gradually replaced around the world.