Fascinating.

Also, That's Numberwang!

Cool stuff!

I like binary counting with fingers, but mostly because you get to give people the ol' double deuce if you count to 132.

Anybody know why there's 24 hours in a day? Apart from it being two twelves...

>> ^lampishthing:

Anybody know why there's 24 hours in a day? Apart from it being two twelves...
Similar to other units of measurement based off the human body (e.g. feet), the resting human heartrate is around 60 beats per minute, so around one beat per second. Using their preference for 60, we start with 60 beats and call it a minute, then up from 60 minutes to set an hour, and find that it comes out to 24 of these "3600 second" hours in a day. Once you've got that there are roughly 24 hours in a day, you can set your mark by that and work backward to define seconds more precisely.


When you've gotten to end, you're confronted with the fact that just because something makes sense, that doesn't mean it's true. (i.e.: I have no idea, and will probably post back once I find out the truth.)

>> ^lampishthing:

Anybody know why there's 24 hours in a day? Apart from it being two twelves...
Ok, so supposedly day and night were divided into twelve because of the 12 moon cycles in a year, or maybe it was because Egyptians liked counting in 12s as much as the Babylonians liked 60. Then there's this guy who proposes a variant on my completely fabricated-on-the-spot theory. So, sounds like we might or might not know the answer to your question.

In addition to the Egyptian theory stated above, I'd like to add the Sumerians into the mix. They invented the sexagesimal system (base 60) and used a unit of length called the "beru". A beru is about 10km and, given a walking speed of 5 km/h, was also used as a unit of time by the Babylonians later on, measuring in at 120 minutes. Since an average day is 12 beru long, it fit rather nicely into their base 60 system and corresponded equally well to the 12 moon cycles in a year.

The Egyptians used seasonal time, meaning their hours didn't have a fixed length -- a mix of seasonal and proper hours was used. The Babylonians, however, used "hours" of a fixed length (~120 minutes), which the Greeks split in half to end up at 24 hours a day.

Or maybe not, can't remember.

Additional tidbit of information: if a positive integer has more divisors than any smaller positive integer, we call it a "highly composite number".>> ^lampishthing:

Anybody know why there's 24 hours in a day? Apart from it being two twelves...

I've always wondered why there were 360 degrees in a circle.

Whoa! 60 votes.
D'Oh, make that 61.

>> ^probie:

I've always wondered why there were 360 degrees in a circle.


I was just making the case to a cousin and my father a couple of months ago that I figured a circle had 360 degrees because the circle of the year just about had 360 days! My skeptic scientific dad was cool with it, but my French cousin poopoo'd it, or whatever dismissive sound they make in French...