Ciao TonyM FYI I'm interested in the confluence of social (including historial) counting and calculation.
I find some of the widespread European decimal based (metric) systems poor compared to the other base systems still widely used in UK & USA for measures. For instance ... - inch (12=1) foot (3=1) yard (220=1) furlong - ounces (16=1) pound (14=1) stone - nautical miles / knot - Fahrenheit v Centigrade Historically there emerged all sorts of mixed-bases for practical calculation, many still in use. WHY so? is a very interesting question. But comes down to the fact the world is not divided into any particular system, rather the physical attributes of a social context fostered different bases of calculation matched to different ways of "carving it up" conceptually. Being able to think in different bases is particularly useful. Since programmers can often think in other than base-10 (binary, octal & hexadecimal are obvious cases) it might be interesting for them too to play the social aspect, where "formal" calculation hits social praxis? A good example is "a baker's dozen" (base-13). Its a case where needed utility built on from (base-12) maths. Another example is how nautical miles are related to longtitude & latitude. This is somewhat different than looking within math itself as a self-referential world with interesting patterns to find & enjoy for their own sake. Also of great merit. Just thoughts. TT TonyM wrote: > Folks, > > Join our Collaborative Project -* Numbers* > > Recent collaborative discussions and illustrated some interesting methods > and challenges for our community. Words and Numbers. > I thought I would initiate a couple to stimulate activity from the > community, join in and contribute if you can otherwise lurkers are fine. > > *AIM: *Develop and improve the ability for people to interrogate large > number lists with TiddlyWiki. Allow each number to be annotated with > relationships to other numbers. > > *Inspiration: *Whatever your relationship to numbers, every number small > or large has its own qualities, do you have a favorite number?, did you > know the difference between 0 and one is either 1 or infinity?, Do you know > about the beauty in the primes?, and that most of the common numbers 12 in > a dozen, 24 hours a day, sixty seconds/minutes in a minute/hour and 360 > degrees are all some of the most divisible numbers? > > - Let us stick to the counting numbers - integers to start with. > - Let's have a way to annotate numbers with info we can share, > manually, programmatically or by import > - Learn more about numbers > - Build various number related algorithms in Tiddlywiki > - Identify primes, Squares, special number sequences > - Find what sequences fit within other well known sequences > > Large lists present possible performance issues, Numbers can stay in a > single data tiddler, or generated in a list until you make a single tiddler > once you wish to add information to a given number. Canned search strings > that may interest people would also be fun, like reoccuring palindromes.. > > *Where do we start?* > > - The best way to build a list of numbers and add annotations to each > as desired > - How do we best generate them? Look them up? > - How do we annotate numbers (eg if a number has the field prime it is > a prime number) > - What code would identify and flag which numbers are prime, can it > restart without returning to 1 if you extend you number set further? > - Provide an easy to use way to list numbers with a shared nature, > without necessarily re-computing > - How to we share new number annotations and relationships we can add > to our own list in a non-destructive way > > Lets get started Numberphiles. > *A person who is a lover of numbers.* > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TiddlyWiki" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tiddlywiki/71d6e11d-cc59-49c2-b939-8267adc4e19c%40googlegroups.com.
