• mlfh@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    78
    ·
    1 year ago

    One benefit of base 12 and base 60 over base 10 for everyday use with things like time is simple factorization. You can divide 12 hours evenly into halves, thirds, quarters, and sixths, and 60 minutes evenly into halves, thirds, quarters, fifths, sixths, tenths, etc. With base 10, you’ve just got halves and fifths.

    • kvn@midwest.social
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      26
      ·
      1 year ago

      Another benefit of base 12 is that you can count to 12 easily with one hand by using your thumb to count each of the 3 segments on your 4 fingers.

      I learned that on that other website prior to the great migration and it blew my mind then.

    • Squirrel@thelemmy.club
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      Yeah, I know all about that, but I don’t think we’ll convince people to change everything to base 12, so let’s go with a base 10 clock.

      • Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        25
        ·
        1 year ago

        A base-10 unit circle would be abhorrent. 1/2 of a circle is an important concept, but 1/5th and 1/10th of a circle are rarely used in geometry or trigonometry. Meanwhile, a right angle (1/4 of a circle) would require an ugly fraction, and the angle of an equilateral triangle (1/6th) would require a repeating decimal.

        Think of 12-hour clocks and 360-degree circles as paper bags. When we’re fucking with angular concepts, you do not want to take those bags off Decimal’s head.