From edward.cherlin.sy.67@aya.yale.edu Mon Jun 18 23:37:28 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: Edward.Cherlin.SY.67@aya.yale.edu X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_1_3); 19 Jun 2001 06:37:28 -0000 Received: (qmail 5627 invoked from network); 19 Jun 2001 06:37:27 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.142) by l9.egroups.com with QMQP; 19 Jun 2001 06:37:27 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mta6.snfc21.pbi.net) (206.13.28.240) by mta3 with SMTP; 19 Jun 2001 06:37:27 -0000 Received: from mcp.aya.yale.edu ([216.103.90.93]) by mta6.snfc21.pbi.net (Sun Internet Mail Server sims.3.5.2000.01.05.12.18.p9) with ESMTP id <0GF500GKAZQA19@mta6.snfc21.pbi.net> for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Mon, 18 Jun 2001 23:37:23 -0700 (PDT) Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2001 22:35:31 -0700 Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: hexadecimal and lojban In-reply-to: X-Sender: cherlin@postoffice.pacbell.net To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Message-id: <5.1.0.14.0.20010618222433.00b02388@postoffice.pacbell.net> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 5.1 Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed References: From: Edward Cherlin At 03:55 PM 6/18/2001, Cyril A Slobin wrote: >On Mon, 18 Jun 2001 pycyn@aol.com wrote: > > > As the specification of bases makes clear, Lojban considers decimal as > > fundamental. Anyway, duodecimal is the most convenient form for humans > > (finger counting aside). > >In fact finger counting is even more convenient in duodecimal - four >fingers have twelve phalanxes, and thumb is used for counting. Only one >hand is used instead of two. BTW, how to say 'phalanx' and 'thumb' in >Lojban? You can't claim an advantage for one base over another on the basis of finger counting. You can count up to 1023 on two hands in binary (or if you are really good, in Gray code, where successive numbers differ by one bit). Taking four fingers as 1 each and the thumb as 5, you can do two-column decimal abacus calculations on your hands, a practice which has been taught in schools. Octal actually occurs naturally somewhere in the world where they count on fingers but not thumbs. Duodecimal is described above. The same dodge using the joints and fingertips rather than the phalanxes gives you hex. If you take off your shoes and socks you can do base 20. Counting on the phalanxes of one hand and the fingers of the other gives you base 60. >-- >Cyril Slobin