this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2023
240 points (90.8% liked)

Ask Lemmy

27027 readers
1538 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Nemo@midwest.social 0 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Flounces are the best part of US Customary units. It's all base 2/8/16, which is a hell of a lot more sensible than base 10 units.

[–] irdc@derp.foo 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Is that because you have 16 fingers?

[–] ChicoSuave@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

We take off our shoes. Duh.

[–] Bluetreefrog@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It’s all base 2/8/16, which is a hell of a lot more sensible than base 10 units.

Debatable. I probably shouldn't restart the whole imperial vs metric debate, but I might just say that people who grow up with metric think exactly the opposite.

[–] Uncle_Bagel@midwest.social 0 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'll convert to metric once we convert to a dozenal number system. Ten is a terrible number to base our counting system on.

[–] Bluetreefrog@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Ten is a terrible number to base our counting system on.

Maybe when you are counting apples, but not when you are dealing with arbitrary amounts. Why else is our number system base 10?

[–] Rouxibeau@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Because ten fingers. Base 12 is still better.

[–] Blamemeta@lemm.ee 0 points 1 year ago

2x2x3. You can divide 12 so many ways, its nice.

[–] orphiebaby@lemm.ee 1 points 8 months ago

Imperial sucks, and metric is better, but still +1 for dozenal. Anybody who isn't for it is either confused about the very concept of different bases (I've talked to plenty of those), or biased.

I don't know why you dozenal advocates are being downvoted.

[–] radix@lemm.ee 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

You're serious? Why? I've genuinely never heard this stance before.

Is it because they're powers of two and are therefore easier to halve, quarter, etc. for baking and cooking purposes?

[–] joel_feila@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah this is why most old measurement systems used 4 8 12. 4 fingers to a palm, you don't count the thumb as a finger. Then 4 palms to arm, for a total of 16 fingers. At 12 arms into a bigger unit so you can count the joints on your hand

[–] radix@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I can't tell if you're kidding. How do you keep track of four palms per arm?

[–] joel_feila@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That actually how the Egyptians made their cubits. Tuck your Thumb under you hand and place all four finger at your elbow. You have about 4 palms before you get to your wrist.

[–] radix@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago

Interesting. Learned something new today, thanks!