how on earth did you give change pre decimal

my goodness 4 farthing is a penny 2S& 6p is a crown

Who came up with this horrid system?

 

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Do you exclusively use metrics, or do you join the rest of the United States in sticking to the "horrid" traditional English measures of feet, inches, ounces, pounds, quarts, gallons, etc?

My point is that just because you can't do math in a base 12 format, is it really necessary to criticize and insult the ancestors of those who used the d/s/£ system for centuries, until quite recent times?

BTW, how do you tell time if you can't handle base 12?

 

Maybe the same people who measure like this: 1 mile is 1760 yards, 1 yard is 3 feet, 1 foot is 12 inches, and so on. Oh, and 1 pound is what, 14 ounces?

The old British "LSD" system is the same as what Charlemagne used in the 9c: 1 pound (libra) = 20 shillings (solidi) = 240 pence (denarii). At least in the 20c, the farthing (1/4 penny), the florin (2 shillings) and the crown (5 shillings) were rather additional or auxiliary unit names ...

Christian

 

16


I've never sold drugs i swear.

 

Hey whatever works.

 

Gotta agree with the others. While other countries have successfully converted to metric for silly things like weights and measures we plod along with inches, feet, yards and miles not to mention pints, quarts etc.
Add to this the liquid measure is different for cooking.
How in the hell do we manage this when there is a much simpler way?

 

By the way, 2s 6d would be a halfcrown. :-D

 

try working in a machine shop...we have to convert fractions to decimal everyday, THEN they throw metric at us sometimes

 

You just answered my question as to why WE keep our sytstem. You have to buy more tools to get anything done!

 

Ok, the ORIGINAL british system was based on fourthlings (farthings), Halfpennies, Pennys, Crowns (60d), Marks (80d) and Pounds (240d). Most of them weren't struck for a very long time after their conception. The system is similar to that of the french.

Farthing is a decent from Fourthling, which is the correct middle english term for a quarter of something.

 

Tuppence!

 

The British L/S/d system is actually based on an old roman system which operated on a base 60 system. 60 is one heck of a number. It is divisible by 1,2,3,4,5,6,10,12,15,20, and 30. It's multiples of 120 and 240 also come in handy.

While it seems odd to us today I'm sure that the people who grew up using it had no trouble and could make change nearly as quickly as we do today. Possibly faster since today most cashiers have to have the register tell them how much to give back, and then have difficulty figuring out what coins to use to get the cents portion.

US carpenters have the same problem, handling fractions in 16ths, 8ths, and quarters rounding to get inches which then convert to feet on a base 12 system, and then the feet work on a base 10 system. Give me metric anyday.

You should be embracing metric since it is already on a decimal system. he problem you have now is you are having to convert the fractions to decimal INCHES which are still on a base 12 system. Wouldn't it be so much nicer if it was al metric and everything was decimal and you never had to convert anything

 

i agree that the customary system sucks but its not my fault somebody created this system

 

Sorry RickyB but we ARE holding YOU responsible. Sending out emails right now about this.
Just kidding of course but LMAO at the same time.

 

It hardly seems fair to hold our long time member RickyB responsible for postings by newcomer Rickyb?

 

It's simple...really!

It is other peoples fault that they won't vote for politicians to change this stupid system we have in the US.
I love metric forever!!!

ps) There is noting wrong with a base 12 or base 60 system, as long as your measuring/monetary system matches your counting system.

The measures we use are actually derived form an older base 2 system.

For Volume
2 Mouthfuls of drink in a Jigger
2 Jiggers in a Jack
2 Jacks in a Jill
2 Jills in a Cup
2 Cups in a Pint
2 Pints in a Quart
2 Quarts in a Pottle
2 Pottles in a Gallon
2 Gallons in a Peck
2 Pecks in a Kenning
2 Kennings in a Bushel
2 Bushels in a Cask
2 Casks in a Barrel
2 Barrels in a Hogshead
2 Hogsheads in a Butt
2 Butts in a Tun
1 Tun of Drink=1 Ton of weight (give or take, since you're measuring all this with your mouth)

Now, if you can remember all that, you should be fine. (I certainly didn't; I looked it up.)

[To gas station attendant]: Yes, I'd like 10101101001 Jiggers of Premium Unleaded. Thanks sonny!

~
​

 

This reminds me something. The trend is to get into the metrical system. The arab digits and the decimal system make it easy to deal with those figures. But then, we handle them with computers, than use the binary system.

Binary system and "2 mouthfuls make a jigger" system are something we may not be so used to. But if we were, a system where everything can be divided by two, perhaps would not be so complicated.

Nowadays, our computers grow from 2 Mb RAM to 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, 4096... funny, isn't it?

But anyway, I personally prefer the decimal system.

 

Binary denominations for Euro

Yes, instead of...
€2 - €1 - €0,50 - €0,20 - €0,10 -- €0,05 - - €0,02 -- - €0,01 _ _ _ it would be
€2 - €1 - €0,50 - €0,25 - €0,125 - €0,0625 - €0,03125 - €0,015625
and, if needed, €0,0078125 (1/128th Euro)

and instead of
€5,00 - €10,00 - €20,00 - €50,00 - €100,00 - €200,00 - €500,00 it would be
€4,00 - €08,00 - €16,00 - €32,00 - € 64,00 - €128,00 - €256,00
and of course €512,00

or (in binary)
€ 0,0000001
€ 0,000001
€ 0,00001
€ 0,0001
€ 0,001
€ 0,01
€ 0,1
€ 1,00
€ 10,00
€ 100,00
€ 1000,00
€ 10000,00
€ 100000,00
€ 1000000,00
€ 10000000,00
€ 1000000000,00

 

Time is not measured in base 12. It is measured in base 10.

 

Unless you are talking Troy pounds, then I think it is 12.