Re: OT: Writing numbers longhand
On Monday 24 May 2004 14:50, Daniel Barclay wrote:
> richard lyons wrote:
> > On Thursday 06 May 2004 14:43, Paul Johnson wrote:
> >>...1,234,567.89 is "one million, two-hundred-thirty-four
> >>thousand, five-hundred-sixty-seven and eighty-nine
> >> one-hundredths."
> > Oh come on - I never heard anyone pedantic enough to spell out
> > the decimals like that.
> That's not pedantic. That's the original form before we started
> abbreviating as you refer to next.
I very much doubt that was the original form. Can you give me source
to back up that assertion? [hint: Try Milton, round about 1653;
Simon Stevin, tr. R Norton, "The Art of Tenths, or Decimal
Arithmetike" 1585; H Lyte "The Art of Tenths or Decimall
Arithmeticke" 1619; Napier's Logarithms, tr. E Wright, 1616; or
anything seventeenth or early eighteenth century.]
If it were so, then you would first have to count the decimal places
to work out how large the denominator was. 1.00045678 -- "ah yes
that is one and fortyfive thousand six hundred (and) seventyeight
hundred-millionths." I don't think so! And this is precisely why we
say "point nine eight" not "point ninetyeight" and "point nine eight
seven" not "point ninehundred (and) eightyseven" -- or even "and nine
hundred (and) eightyseven thousandths". The "nine" - first digit
after the decimal point - has the same value regardless of how many
digits are stated after it, so we don't want to name it differently.
> > Everyone says "one million, two hundred (and) thirtyfour
> > thousand, five hundred (and) sixtyseven point eight nine...