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<sarcasm> We should also teach children to start counting at 0 instead of 1. While we're at it, tell them that we only have 8 fingers (not 10), and thus octal w
by waynecochran 10y ago
<sarcasm>
We should also teach children to start counting at 0 instead of 1. While we're at it, tell them that we only have 8 fingers (not 10), and thus octal would be the conventional base and we can use our thumbs for carry and overflow bits.
</sarcasm>
- Avshalom 10y ago<totally not sarcasm> we should teach children dozen-al math and program in balanced ternary</totally not sarcasm>
- waynecochran 10y ago12 is not a power of two though. Is there an easy way to convert to/from binary/dozenal?
- Buttons840 10y agoYes, it is possible to convert from any numeric base to any other numeric base. Why is 2 so special? Is it more important for humans to be able to calculate quantities in their head, or to be able to convert to obscure computer formats?
- waynecochran 10y agoOf course you can convert between any two bases. It's trivial to convert between bases that are a power of two. I don't know of a trivial way to convert between base 12 and base 2. 2 is very special to computers -- that's the base they use.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- flukus 10y ago> We should also teach children to start counting at 0 instead of 1 We do, not when they're starting out but the number line is introduced pretty early to children. Even earlier we teach them to count backwards with zero being the final element. Kids aren't strangers to the concept of zero.