3 ms·

Well, the decimal calendar had 12 months of 30 days each, with either 5 or 6 extra days depending on leap years. Months had three ten-day "weeks". As you see,

by seszett 10y ago

Well, the decimal calendar had 12 months of 30 days each, with either 5 or 6 extra days depending on leap years. Months had three ten-day "weeks". As you see, nobody is trying to fight physical reality, since day and year are hard lengths that you can't redefine. But decimal time, decimal calendar and more generally decimal units are all about trying to eliminate as much as possible the historical peculiarities that are not grounded in physical reality: The irregular length of months, the weird 24 hours in a day, and the base 60 which has been obsolete for millennia now. All of these do not give any advantage to the users of these units today. Divisibility by 3, 6 or 12 are useless today because we now master decimal numbers easily. I know Imperial units users still often use fractions, but metric units users don't, and it just works. Not once in my life have I been thinking "oh, how I wish I could express 0.41 centimeters in fractions". In the same way, your now 1-hour task would take you something like half a decimal hour instead, or 50 decimal minutes, and you wouldn't even think about it.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
ChoHag 10y ago
> Well, the decimal calendar had 12 months of 30 days each, with either 5 or 6 extra days depending on leap years. So not 10^x, 10^y and 10^z consistently without the constant need for special-case exceptions? > Months had three ten-day "weeks". So not 10^x-day weeks then? > decimal [time-measuring] units are all about trying to eliminate as much as possible the historical peculiarities Eliminate? I think you mean change. > The irregular length of months, the weird 24 hours in a day, and the base 60 which has been obsolete for millennia now. All of these do not give any advantage to the users of these units today. There is nothing more right about 24 than 10, unless you need to take your socks off to count. There is nothing more right about 60 than 10, unless you need to take your friends' socks off to count. 10 gives advantages to people who count on their fingers. But, amusingly, less advantage to finger-counters than just about any other even-numbered base that isn't 2. > Divisibility by 3, 6 or 12 are useless today because we now master decimal numbers easily. I see you're a maths teacher! I, also, love the pure enthusiasm of the classroom. You can smell it a mile away. I think that's enough from me. The rest is just imposition anyway.

by seszett 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

ChoHag 10y ago

> Well, the decimal calendar had 12 months of 30 days each, with either 5 or 6 extra days depending on leap years. So not 10^x, 10^y and 10^z consistently without the constant need for special-case exceptions? > Months had three ten-day "weeks". So not 10^x-day weeks then? > decimal [time-measuring] units are all about trying to eliminate as much as possible the historical peculiarities Eliminate? I think you mean change. > The irregular length of months, the weird 24 hours in a day, and the base 60 which has been obsolete for millennia now. All of these do not give any advantage to the users of these units today. There is nothing more right about 24 than 10, unless you need to take your socks off to count. There is nothing more right about 60 than 10, unless you need to take your friends' socks off to count. 10 gives advantages to people who count on their fingers. But, amusingly, less advantage to finger-counters than just about any other even-numbered base that isn't 2. > Divisibility by 3, 6 or 12 are useless today because we now master decimal numbers easily. I see you're a maths teacher! I, also, love the pure enthusiasm of the classroom. You can smell it a mile away. I think that's enough from me. The rest is just imposition anyway.