This makes me feel better for thinking that the way we write (standard Western) music impedes understanding of the way modern chromatic music sounds. And for t

This makes me feel better for thinking that the way we write (standard Western) music impedes understanding of the way modern chromatic music sounds. And for the same reasons, really. Putting together things like "Four Twenties" makes sense when you only count to a hundred, and less sense when you need to, say, express the speed of light or the size of an electron. I'm sure the musical system made a lot more sense with diatonic sounds, but once you add in accidentals, you're just retaining backwards compatibility because it used to work and the then-living people were familiar with it.