Why do monkeys count in base-8?
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 18 сен 2024
- Check out Mark's channel: / @afieldbiologist
Main channel video over here: • Rarefaction curves and...
Details about Greg's school talk will be on his site here: www.gregfoot.c...
This is the second channel so you're welcome to subscribe here for the odd video (very odd) but the main channel is the place to be for regular, high-quality videos (higher-quality, let's say). / standupmaths
Sounds like jan Misali would be a fan of a hypothetical 3-toed sloth society
seximal is the bestimal
without the context of this video thats probably the funniest thing ive read in a while
well maybe but the method for counting in seximal on human hands is pretty good anyway
What kind of new radio shows do they have?
I would recommended you all to watch "the best way to count", very interesting response to jan misali
4:53 "Pandas! That's how successful that is." 😄
If animals could talk, they’d all say they have 10 fingers. Because number bases.
Your talk is based on the assumption that humans use base ten because we have 10 fingers. 10 fingers is likely an influence on why base 10 is so common cross-culturally, but it is not universal among humans, meaning the base we use is not determined solely by our digits. There are many examples of cultures that used base 20, such as the Maya, and apparently in the Nimbia language they use base 12. There is a huge variety found in the languages of New Guinea, such as base 3, base 4, base 6, base 27, and base 15, maybe others. Even within English and the Germanic languages, which we think of as base 10, there is so much base 12 thinking embedded. The fact that "eleven" and "twelve" follow a different linguistic pattern than the rest of the "teens" suggests that counting up to 12 developed first and then remained important even as the system became decimal, and to this day in America we very, very, very often count in dozens. I think the prevalence of "dozen" as a unit might not be as strong in Australia or the UK, but in America, eggs come in dozens. Bagels come in dozens. Donuts come in dozens. 6 is "half a dozen." If there were say 400 something people at an event, we say "hundreds of people," but if 40 something people came to a show we say "a few dozen people." We might not say "four dozen and 3," but we very well might say "four and a half dozen" for things that commonly come in dozens. Base twelve is still embedded in the culture, even if our numeral and linguistic system is normally base ten.
I suspect that in the past there was more diversity in how cultures counted. The fact that the vast majority of languages use base 10 might have as much to do with cultural diffusion as 10 being a natural base to use given our anatomy.
Two more fun words are "gross" (a dozen dozens) and "score" (twenty) to point toward using other bases. These words seem to be falling out of use in modern American English, but some other languages still see their echoes in how they count. French, for example, uses a base-twenty system for the higher two-digit numbers.
Actually, even those cultures that think they are base ten, aren't entirely. We use a 12 hour clock. A 7 day week. 60 minutes an hour. Anyone who has grown up in the US uses base 7, 12 and 60 most days without even knowing it.
Of course, the vast majority of us use base ten most of the time. Just wanted to point out that there are numerous exceptions.
Base 20 sheep counting: ruclips.net/video/Oev332D0K0I/видео.html
12 is good for division i think that's why it's used in a lot of units, but still word dozen basically is two-ten - 2+10. So still ten based system.
Same for 60 based system of ancient Sumerians (which still lives in minutes an seconds). It was used most probably cause it's good for divisions. But one digit was written in decimal base.
So we are very inclined to 10 based systems because of our fingers.
I try to be inclusive to new ideas, but base 27 is going too far.
Very much appreciate that you take the time to get into some maths, wouldn't want the video to devolve into something frivolous like "the wonders of the natural world" or "Matt Parker Reacts to Being Stung By a South American Wasp".
Some have hypothesized that our ability to throw objects contributed significantly to human evolution, which I think depends pretty heavily on our thumbs, so I concur that us arriving at base-8 counting would have been unlikely :P
Thumb as 4th digit instead of 5th?
Maybe would've needed some extra time to cook that up evolutionarily, though.
No mention of Octal, sad programmer here.
Did you know that if an infinite number of monkeys bashed at an infinite number of typewriters you'd eventually get the complete source to Windows, which is how it was developed... true story.
3:20 none of this bull 😂
i seriously love all of your field trips/excursion videos. they're always different and always fascinating. also, hopefully, keeps you from burning out.
Matt Parker - climbs trees using Reidemeister moves
Imagine developing opposable thumbs, just to get rid of them again 😅
Wait until you see the shenanigans whales got up to!
I wonder if anyone has referred to climbing a tree as "solving topological problems" before. 😆
It would be pretty funny if the human characters in Futurama counted in base-8 instead of base-10 because they all have one less finger on each hand.
Bart Simpson once had a line about shoplifting being a "four-finger discount".
First thing I noticed is the non locked ID. I guess I climb a lot. 😂
Monkeys count using base 8 because they are opposed to using their thumbs......
I imagine matt gets dozens of emails every day singing the praises of base 12.
"dozens"
Base 10 has nothing to do with fingers. The different bases used throughout history are usually based on trade or natural groupings. Base 10 has something to do with ancient Greek money; I would guess 2 and 5 were easier to construct with their system. Most early civilizations went with bases that often allowed easy division into 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, so 60, which was either divided into five twelves or six tens depending on language.
Britain was still using a 120 system for money until the last century.
Was impressed at the amount of hardware it takes to climb. Liked like quite the leg and core workout
I can confirm I always count in base 8
Nice hanging around, guys.
Would you not have been about 2 meters off the ground, when you got stung on the back of the head
I mean... head two meters up? But not two meters OFF the ground becuase that I feel that usually referrs to the height of your feet away from the ground
@@kilian9448 I suppose it depends on the definition, I was thinking of the place where the sting happened as the point youd measure from, as opposed to his feet
Hope Matt didn't watch the video of the guy studying monkey eating eagles who, after he retrieved a chick from a nest in the canopy, then fell.
Amazingly he lived, broke a leg, and the chick survived too!
Well, I was intrigued by the title, but left a little disappointed. It's fun to know that monkey spiders have 8 fingers, but I was more interested if they understood the concept of counting - and then used their fingers as base.
In other, more advanced human societies in other timelines of the universe, humans use base 6, since we have 5 fingers on one hand, and 5 on the other, so we'd use one hand for the base unit's place digit, and the other hand for the next 5 place digits. This would allow us to count, on our fingers, all the way up to 35 (in base 10). Apparently there was some folks in New Guinea who've done this. Sadly, it didn't catch on in other places. It's the most logical base, since it easily shows primes (always at 6n±1), and, with some exploration, shows why there are always more twin primes, and works well with either base 2 or 3.
1:56 No you're not. A rope is made of many threads.
"Nice belt!"
If I ever meet a monkey, I'll be sure to ask what 342-173 is, and see if they give the answer Tom Lehrer had in mind.
@2:29 what sort of wasps are these - the type that can sting you and it will not be a good thing hanging up there !
I wonder if the segments of the fingers would facilitate a base 12 or a base 48, like how the Babylonians used a base 60 because they incorporated finger segments (3x4=12) on one hand with fingers+thumb (12x5=60) on the other.
The insect flying in the background behind you flew through the loop behind you, I think a couple of times? I guess looking for a hole.
Colobi, which are Old World monkeys, also have no thumbs. The word "colobus" is Greek for "cut short", referring to the stump of a thumb.
Because their computers have 24 bit word
Interesting base 8 because 8=2^3
What's the big metal thing and why is it up in the canopy? Does it live there, or did it come up with you this time?
On the main channel the video explains its and artificial macaws nest.
@@AzureImperium7701X They talk about it in this very video too.
Hi Matt!
Hello! I'm logged into the main channel account now.
@@standupmaths Pfft. What a sell-out.
It's okay Matt, I talk to meowself too sometimes.. 🐱
Because they're using their thumbs for something else?
Your rope spinning reminds me of the opening scene in “Thor: Ragnarok” where Thor is chatting with Surtur whilst hanging in a trap. 😂
you seem to have a twist in your helmet strap over your right ear ! when doing thing like this no twists or crosses or knots should be allowed no matter how insignificant! #topology
8 fingers
I prefer base 60...
Why do monkeys count in base-8?
Good question.
Title was just usual click bait to troll base-12ers.
So you have something to look at when you talk to them
Because they use "ook-tal".
1000th thumbs up.
It was a good conversation, but matt changing subject and not giving attention is annoying
Do monkeys count?
These aren't different bases. They are all unary with a different limitation of digits. If anything, humans' fingers would give us base-11, because we can show 0-10 fingers, which is 11 unique symbols (then you have the more intense versions where you can use positioning to count on fingers in binary or more complicated finger posing for ternary or [etc.] and reach much higher numbers, but those are highly impractical, to the point where it becomes easier to invent a writing system so you don't have to keep up with such large amounts in your head).
Looks like you got your ---- in a sling
First?🎉
First!
Actually second
😎 'Promo sm'