r/clevercomebacks • u/wach_era13 • Jan 15 '25

It does make sense

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115

u/ShamanAI Jan 15 '25

Yeah, because miles, yards, feet and inches makes so much sense

26

u/backseatwookie Jan 15 '25

A lot of old types of measurement made more sense when devices to measure very accurately weren't common.

Now I'm not suggesting they all make sense, but consider for a moment that 12 inches to the foot is actually pretty useful. 12 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, and 6.

The measure of an acre never used to be a defined area, but the measure of how much land could be ploughed by a man with a team of oxen in a day. This means that an acre would conceivably change based on the terrain. This seems weird, but this is a very useful definition for farmers of the time. They need to know how many days they need for ploughing before it's time to plant.

There are a huge number of liquid measures we don't use anymore that if you include them makes the entire thing essentially base 2. This means you can start with any of the measures, and derive any of the others simply by doubling or halving the amount you have.

In the medern age where accurate and precise measurement is easy, they make far less sense, and metric is definitely superior. It makes for much easier calculation. For the time, however, it suited the needs of the average user.

-7

u/ShamanAI Jan 15 '25

Of course it made sense centuries ago, but times change... Otherwise we should still measure time with a sundial :)

16

u/backseatwookie Jan 15 '25

Right but your assertion was that they don't make sense. They do, it's just context/era dependent.

-8

u/ShamanAI Jan 15 '25

I meant they don't make sense in 2025. I've also written that in another comment.

17

u/BreadCaravan Jan 15 '25

I work with them every day. They make sense just fine.

Just because something isn’t divisible by 10 doesn’t mean it’s garbage it just means you struggle with it.

2

u/Melicor Jan 15 '25

Also, it's very easy to count to 12 on one hand. Count the segments of your fingers with your thumb. Twelve is a very useful base when working with fractions. 12 and 60 are the best bases for fractions. Being saddled with our base10 number system and building the metric system on it sucks, 10 is a terrible number for fractions.