On 27/12/05 10:13 AM, "Robert H. Bushnell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> 2005 December 26 > The newspaper here in Boulder has printed an article about the energy needed > to get Santa Claus to every child in one night. It takes 214,200 reindeer > to do it. It takes 14.3 quintillion joules of energy. > > As I start to write to the paper about prefixes to use instead of > quintillion, it becomes clear that readers know how to change quintillion to > an exponent. They know the series million, billion, trillion, quadrillion, > quintillion, sextillion, septillion. Each is 1000 times bigger. But they > do not know the SI prefixes. > > So how do we make exajoule as easy to remember? > The series above is mega, giga, tera, peta, exa, zeta, yotta. > Do we have a mnemonic for this series? > > This is going on my list of defects in SI. Please help. What can we do? > Thanks. > Robert Bushnell. Dear Robert and All, Prefix mnemonics Many activities have memory helpers for beginners so that they can readily become involved, and so that they can develop confidence quickly. Well-known examples are the word F-A-C-E used to remember the 'space' notes of the treble clef stave in music. This is associated with the sentence 'Every Good Boy Deserves Fruit' to remember the 'line' notes E, G, B, D, and F. These memory helpers, technically known as mnemonics, are from Greek words associated with mindfulness and remembering. However, I have not found equivalent mnemonics to help young people learn metric basics, such as the names of the SI prefixes. So I have devised two mnemonics to help people learn SI prefixes easily. Details of the development and rationale for these mnemonics is indicated in these tables. Prefixes less than 1 (sub-multiples) millie, mike's nana, pickled fish at zepto's yacht(o) milli micro nano pica femto atto zepto yocto m ยต n p f a z y 10^-3 10^-6 10^-9 10^-12 10^-15 10^-18 10^-21 10^-24 Note: I considered fems instead of fish, but I couldn't bear the sound of it. Prefixes more than 1 (multiples) killer Meg, Giggling, Terrified Peter's Extra Zits. Yuk! kilo mega giga tera peta exa zetta yotta k M G T P E Z Y 10^3 10^6 10^9 10^12 10^15 10^18 10^21 10^24 Note: I considered 'kindly Meg' but then I grew to like 'killer Meg' much better. I make no apology for the silliness of the words that I chose for these mnemonics. Mnemonics seem to work best if they contain off-the-wall ideas coupled with reasonably strong rhythms; I've been wondering for years why: 'Every Good Boy Deserves Fruit'; but the mnemonic still works, and works well. Pat Naughtin LCAMS Geelong, Australia [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://metricationmatters.com P.S. If you would like this in the form of an MS Word document, send an email to me at [EMAIL PROTECTED] with mnemonic in the subject line.
