On Sat, 27 Dec 2003 20:09:57 Carl Sorenson wrote: >Euric, you and Marcus continue to see this in terms of right and wrong, >truth and error, or even moral goodness and badness (as in the reference to >Hitler). > NO! Lest this goes "out of control", again, NO, I didn't mean to tie this to *moral* issues AT ALL, my dear friend Carl! Please understand that when it comes to *scientific issues* there IS indeed at times issues that deal with 'right vs. wrong', but that these have NOTHING to do with morals.
True, a lot of things in math, for instance, are a result of the adoption of *conventions* (well said in this regard, BTW). However, once these are established and agreed upon, it doesn't make any sense to "challenge" them. Please allow me to give you an example: 2 + 2 is 4, right? Imagine if all of a sudden someone would come with a new set of rules or conventions to state that, no: A -- B :: C!!! Evidently, technically, if you rigorously state a framework where you define 'A' to be such and such, 'B' to be such and such, etc, there should not be a problem. But then again, why? Why would anyone do that? It would be utterly confusing, wouldn't it? On the other hand, refering to '32 kilobytes' as meaning '32 768', i.e. when what is meant is 32 x 1024 bytes, IS *wrong*! Why? Because the prefix kilo is *defined* to be or refer to 10 (*10* as a base!) to the power of 3, not 2 to 10 or any power (when it comes to the other math prefixes, like mega, giga, etc). Just because 2 to the power of 10 *happens* to be very close to 1000, 2 to 20 close to 1000000, etc does not give anyone the authority to claim they're the one and the same. Sorry, but they are NOT. >...The fact is, the use of powers of two *is* the correct way to build memory >structures in computers, if you accept that the simplest and cheapest way is >the correct one. I don't think anyone was arguing against that, Carl. Indeed, computers are built around this binary framework. However (and here is *my* private beef with this industry) nothing would prevent us from abandoning this practice and start building memory chips and buses and all with nice decimal chunks of it instead! For instance, I'd much rather see 10-bit, 100-bit buses than the current 16, 32, 64, etc... Nothing, *technically* would make such construction wrong or flawed IMHO. It's just a pity that someone "decided" to call 8 bits a byte, as opposed to 10 being a bite. (NOTE: I would be interested to know and learn why building decimal structures with binary bases would be inefficient and why, please. Thanks) Evidently (and I concede that) this wouldn't help the "decimal cause", so to speak, as 10 bits would still refer to 1024 possibilities, etc. But it would certainly get rid of the binary mentality "at *our* level"! It's just a pity that it seems a little too late for that, apparently... ... no computer engineer will misunderstand >someone who speaks of a "32 kilobyte L1 cache". They will know that it is >32 * 2^10 bytes. Carl, just because these professionals grew accustommed to linking these two does not make it right to do so! People may be accustommed to call an otter a ferrett, but it would not make it so, would it? (Food for thought) > If there is a high level of agreement, understanding, and >usage, then it is part of language. Ah-ha, I see. But here it's probably fair to say that you'd be delving into "*cultural*" territory! In this case then, true, arguments would be weak to shoot it down, but please understand that I was not trying to touch this aspect. I wouldn't want to get involved with the likes of clicks for kilometers, and similar stuff. It would be fruitless. I learned and know when not to pick certain fights... >... But it will not help your position to compare a nonmoral issue to a >moral one, or to see matters of convention as matters of truth. >... Please see my first paragraph, please. Nice talking to you, Carl. Thanks for your insights. Cheers, my friend. Marcus ____________________________________________________________ Get 25MB of email storage with Lycos Mail Plus! Sign up today -- http://www.mail.lycos.com/brandPage.shtml?pageId=plus
