5 ms·
Humans are naturally bad at base 10. This is noticeable when learning counting and arithmetic - children often skip 7 and jumble 6, 7, 8. Base-10 is not so bad
by afpx 8y ago
Humans are naturally bad at base 10. This is noticeable when learning counting and arithmetic - children often skip 7 and jumble 6, 7, 8. Base-10 is not so bad once one has learned it, though.
Humans are really good at doubling and halving, which the Imperial system excels at.
- pcnix 8y agoThat's false, the Imperial system is pretty bad at doubling or halving. What's double of 3.7 feet? Or half of 1.5? What is 3.7 feet even? Is it 3 feet 7 inches or 3 feet plus 7th of a feet (This last question is a nitpick) Any of these in metric are super simple, but just harder to do in base-12.
- kiriakasis 8y agoAnd I would add, it is not immediate to go from 200 inch to 18 feet 2 inches
- afpx 8y agoIn practice, as the previous poster pointed out, Imperial numbers are rational, not real. You wouldn’t normally experience ‘3.7’ feet. Don’t get me wrong, I’m certainly not a proponent of the Imperial system (for instance, calculating prices for groceries is painful). I am just pointing out that the metric system doesn’t take into account many Human use cases (Base-10 isn’t great for Humans). It was a system forced upon people by an ‘ivory tower’, and consistent with US philosophy, it makes sense that they rejected it.
- afpx 8y agoAmericans are pretty awesome.
- Nursie 8y agoThe imperial system is not even in a consistent base!