My ze high

Status
Not open for further replies.
Sponsored Links
The solution is therefore, as with many things, to do it properly. ... It is "nought point one, two".
Yes, of course it is - but, as I have said, over the years I have encountered many people who do not 'do it properly', and once they start thinking of it as "nought point twelve", the scene is set for the sort of misunderstanding we are discussing here.

In this case, since the consequences are far wider-ranging that simply 'a matter of language', those who think in this way certainly need to be 'corrected and educated' (as hopefully we have been trying to do in this thread).

To you and me, and a high proportion of the population, the concept of fractional numbers expressed in 'decimal notation', with a decimal point separating the integer and 'fractional' part is 'obvious' and intuitive'. However, even within my family there are people who find the concept far less clear - whiclst I obviously try to 'educate' them, I certainly don't hold it against them!

Kind Regards, John
 
It happened to A&W burger chain in the US. ... Their 1/3 pounder was a flop, because people thought that was less than a McDonald's 1/4 pounder! :rolleyes:
It happens all the time.

For those (the majority) 'who understand', decimal notation is more immediately understandable than 'vulgar fractions' - for example, many, maybe even most, people have to at least 'stop and think for a second' before deciding which was the larger of, say, 5/8 and 3/5, whereas they would instantly know that 0.625 was greater than 0.6 (or 0.600 :) ).

Kind Regards, John
 
Sponsored Links
You might like this April fools video on inches vs centimetres...


He's a German born Canadian and so usually uses cm. He could have made this a lot simpler using 127ths of an inch of course, but I guess he knew that!!
 
I know someone who managed to connect a D Sub upside down, to this day I have to admit I wouldn't have believed it possible unless I'd actually seen it.
 
Speaking of how people struggle with decimal points, I have the following to offer. In an underground tram station in Portland OR, I came across a celebration of science that Portland had paid millions to have carved into marble. This particular carving is to demonstrate mathematics...

It hit me within a few seconds. I'll leave it to the reader to deduce how the mistake arose.
I can just see it is wrong after the first line - the next six digits and the last six digits should be transposed, but

I can see no pattern other than that.

What am I missing?
 
What am I missing?
My assumption was that someone gave the carver a piece of paper with one hundred decimal places per line. He then drew a square on the paper, at the left hand side, ten decimal places wide and ten rows deep, and carved that into the very expensive stone. (So he's carved places 1-10, 101-110 etc). I must be really sad as I believe I was the first person to notice.
 
Ah, so actual digits 101 to 106 and 807 to 812 being transposed in the carving is just a coincidence.
 
Yes, given the nature of pi, it contains a large number of coincidences!
 
Yes I've heard of storey of an "electrician" fixing a problem with an electric garage opener. His diagnosis was the motor wasn't powerful enough to lift the door, it being a 1/2 HP motor, so he changed it for a 1/4 HP motor as 4 is bigger than 2. Probably an urban myth, but one you'd like to believe is true.
A panel transformer failed with obvious overheating and the electrician decided a 4.16A had to be more powerful than 2.08A. Sadly they were both 100VA and it took me ages to realise the problem I was there for was it was now 24V instead of 48V and some items were not working.

Another electrician tried to tell me my 230V 3KW kettle would trip a 10A MCB on 110V supply because things running on 110V use more than double than on 230V.
We had to wait but we enjoyed our tea.
 
Last edited:
I know someone who managed to connect a D Sub upside down, to this day I have to admit I wouldn't have believed it possible unless I'd actually seen it.
I've known a 15 into a 25.

But how the hell unside down? he must have used a big hammer.
 

DIYnot Local

Staff member

If you need to find a tradesperson to get your job done, please try our local search below, or if you are doing it yourself you can find suppliers local to you.

Select the supplier or trade you require, enter your location to begin your search.


Are you a trade or supplier? You can create your listing free at DIYnot Local

 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Sponsored Links
Back
Top