tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Jun 06 09:12:48 2012
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Re: [Tlhingan-hol] 125,000
The Chinese system is a useful and productive
one, but the pattern that we see in Klingon from
ten to a million is that there is a new word for
every factor of ten, just as American English has
a new word for every factor of a thousand.
I like your attention-span-saving suggestion.
- Robyn
At 10:02 '?????' 6/6/2012, Felix Malmenbeck wrote:
I've always just assumed that Klingon numbers
work in such a way that it'd be wa'bIp cha'netlh
vaghSaD, but I see now that that's not strictly
stated in TKD. I would assumed, however, that
it's sort of like the system commonly used in
modern-day China: You have names for 0-9, and
then words for 10, 100, 1 000 and - unlike in
English - 10 000 ("myriad"). Then, instead of
saying "one hundred thousands", you say "ten
myriads". Likewise, 1 000 000 is "100 myriads",
and 10 000 000 becomes "1 000 myriads". Then,
you have the next step: A y¨¬, which is ten
thousand squared, or 100 million. To say "one
billion", you say "10 y¨¬", and ten billion is
"100 y¨¬", and so forth up to the zh¨¤o, which
is 10 000 to the third power, or a myriad myriad
myriads. Next is j¨©ng (10^16), g¨¡i (10^20),
z¨« (10^24) and so forth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_numerals#Large_numbers
In other words, while most of us are used to a
convention which needs a new name for every
factor 1 000 (or, by the long count, 1 000 000),
most Chinese people [as I understand it] would
be used to one which takes a new step for every
factor 10 000. Therefore, I'd guess that the
next [commonly used but unknown to us] Klingon
number-forming element would be one for a 10^2;
the number which is 1 greater than
999,999,999,999 (which, similar to you, I think
would probably be called <HutbIp Hutnetlh HutSaD
Hutvatlh HutmaH Hut'uy' HutbIp Hutnetlh HutSaD
Hutvatlh HutmaH Hut>)*. Perhaps when explaining
such big numbers to laymen, Klingon
mathematicians refer to this element as
<wa''uy''uy'>.
-----------------------------------------
WARNING: Going off on a tangent.
-----------------------------------------
*Another alternative, which requires more
syllables but may not be as demanding on your
attention span, is <HutbIp'uy' Hutnetlh'uy'
HutSaD'uy'...>. That way, you don't have to wait
twelve syllables before you find out what order
of magnitude you're dealing with; it'll always
be right there in the third. One could of course
imagine all sort of systems. For example, one
that squares upwards after 'uy': If the next
number-forming elements is called X, and 1X =
1'uy''uy' = 10^12, then the next one, Y, would
be 1'uy'X (10^18), but 1XX (10^24), and Z would
be 10^48. So, if you wanted to say 24*10^42 (24
tredecillion), you'd have to say cha'maH'uy'XY
loS'uy'XY. Dunno if that'd be practical, but you
never know with alien species :P
________________________________________ From:
Qov [[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, June
06, 2012 17:17 To: De'vID jonpIn; tlhIngan-Hol
Subject: Re: [Tlhingan-hol] 125,000 I see that
TKD says "some of the number forming elements
for higher numbers are ..." and stops at 'uy'.
Clearly there are more we don't know. That
suggests to me that there is one for each place
up as high as Klingons need to count before
whatever their scientifix notation is cuts in.
But just as people who want to be clear when
talking to an international audience avoid words
like billion and say "a thousand million" or "a
mllion million," I imagine 423,198,765,432
could be understood as loSbIp cha'netlh wejSaD
wa'vatlh HutmaH chorgh'uy' Soch bIp javnetlh
vaghSaD loSmaH wejmaH cha'. - Qov At 01:56
'?????' 6/6/2012, De'vID jonpIn
wrote: >Qov: > >>> qepHomwIjDaq jatlh ghojwI',
"chay' <125,000> jIjatlh?" > >*{wa' chorghvI'
'uy'} > >No, not really, but I wish *{-vI'}
generalised in this way (from
{vatlhvI'}). > >qurgh: > >> wa'bIp cha'netlh
vaghSaD > >Qov: > > That makes sense. Is that
canonical, qurgh? > >Why else would we have
{bIp} and
{netlh}? > >-- >De'vID >_________________________
______________________ >Tlhingan-hol mailing
list >[email protected] >http
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