On January 24, 2019 at 21:21, buzz said...
Turns out that we would be much better off if we had eight or sixteen appendages. Our number systems would be much better aligned with modern technology.
I always thought that I came through a rather backward school system, but for some seemingly unfathomable reason in 6th grade we were forced to learn the 16's times table. We wanted to smack the teacher. I'm not sure that anyone in the school system knew why this might be an advantage. Later, when I was in intern in a mainframe programming shop, Hex notation hit and the old timers were struggling, I was instantly at home.
IMO, the reason we have fractional measurement is due to the fact that early humans couldn't read or write, but they could divide a small distance in half, visually. Then, they could cut it in half again and again. Pretty soon (relatively), someone was able to mark a piece of some stable material with those dimensions, write numbers and expand the system.
