[olug] Number systems (was Drill Press)

[Ed Pluta]

---- Aric Aasgaard <aric at omahax.com> wrote: 
> Did you get a drill press yet?
> 
> The non beneficial part of this bump regarding the thread jack:  
> 
> IMO base 10 is not efficient for anything more with 2 or more dimensions.  
> 
> Base 8 makes the most logical sense to me as one could just count with their
> fingers and spaces of one hand without the thumb.  Use both hands for base
> 16.  LOL use up and down fingers for byte length binary count up to 255
> decimal units...
>   
> Maybe it should be more like musical notation.  Seven with 0 and double 0 or
> 8 being the same note an octave apart.  This could then easily be then
> though of on a doubling scale.
>
But, its a lot easier, we are not talking efficient, to just move the decimal point. Which is a function of it being base-10, and probably why most of the world uses that as the standard, including scientists. Its also what most of the world is familiar with. In America we have to do lame conversions from metric to Imperial, so most students have a difficult time with it. Base-10 is also a suitable candidate for finger counting, lol.
 
> Another thing that it sort of broken is that our brains were rasterized in
> elementary school so we tend to think of a unit as a square or a cube.  IMO
I don't tend to think of a unit as a square or cube; I tend to think of a unit as some standard measure (unit circle, meter, liter, etc). 

> a point should be thought of as a circle or sphere without dimension if that
> makes any sense. 
 A point, by definition, has no dimensions so its not really correct to think of it as a circle since it has no space or volume, its dimensions all = 0, but I think I understand what you are mean.

>You can't think of 1 as multi dimensional thing.  If 1 is a
> value as distance from the origin it should be circular in 2 dimensions not
> a square.
Kinda confused here. Are you making the case that one is a non-dimensional thing or that it is dimensionless unless it is used as a measure of distance or change?

Typically when we give a distance the second dimension is implied, just not always stated. Go 10 miles south, is a measure with two directions, just not in typical mathematical notation. It could easily be re-stated as 10 miles, 3/2 pi, assuming no elevation or Z-axis changes ;)

> ....while we are reprogramming why not use Euler's number as the base.
> 
> "Conditioner is better, I leave the hair silky and smooth."
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: olug-bounces at olug.org [mailto:olug-bounces at olug.org] On Behalf Of
> Luke-Jr
> Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2009 9:47 AM
> To: Omaha Linux User Group
> Subject: Re: [olug] OT: Drill Press
> 
> On Sunday 25 October 2009 06:14:22 pm DYNATRON tech wrote:
> > it seems that for most people, base 10 is much easier to work witih.
> 
> Only in the sense that for most (Nebraskan) people, English is much easier
> to 
> work with. If you grew up in a culture using base 6 (ideal for finger-
> counting), you would be familiar with that.
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