On 6 Oct 2004, at 16:03, Rowan Collins wrote:
On Wed, 6 Oct 2004 12:23:14 +0200, Jens Ropers ropers@ropersonline.com wrote:
IMO the "milliard" convention is absolute rubbish, because it effectively breaks the decimal system
I completely disagree. There's nothing "decimal" about million->billion->trillion going up in factors of a thousand rather than of a million, it's completely arbitrary.
My beef with the "milliard"-convention (and why I think it "breaks" the decimal system) is not its number of zeros. If the "milliard"-convention were only to use:
(NB: use a non-proportional font here)
milliard 10^9 1,000,000,000 billiard 10^15 1,000,000,000,000,000 trilliard 10^21 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 etc.
then hey, that's logical and "kinda decimal". I wouldn't have a problem with that.
Likewise, if people were only to use:
million 10^6 1,000,000 billion 10^12 1,000,000,000,000 trillion 10^18 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 etc.
then I wouldn't have a problem with that either.
What '''drives me NUTS''' however is the "traditional" usage, whereby you have:
million 10^6 1,000,000 milliard 10^9 1,000,000,000 billion 10^12 1,000,000,000,000 billiard 10^15 1,000,000,000,000,000 trillion 10^18 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 trilliard 10^21 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 etc.
-- this effectively uses a "duodecimal" system as it were.
((In [[List_of_numbers#English_names_for_powers_of_10]], this latter system is described as the "Continental European" convention, with the "Traditional British" usage being a much more sane alternative (cf. above).))
Sadly, the said "traditional" (I mean "Continental European") usage is what's in use in in the country I'm now again (temporarily) living in -- Germany. IMHO no sane person could actually settle on such a system. Well, at least in Germany that system is ''unanimously'' used, so thank heaven for small favours!
-- ropers [[en:User:Ropers]] www.ropersonline.com