Comment by kazinator
14 hours ago
> construction of the dam began in 01931
Person in far future:
Was that in the original 01931 as in 1931? Or is that the usual truncation of 101931, since most relevant dates are in this decamillennium?
Leading zeros don't do what you think they do; you need look no further than how people say 03 when they mean 2003. A leading zero does not unambiguously say "there are no implied nonzero digits to the left of this zero".
Just, stop.
Or find some other convention, like, say, =1931. The = means, this is an exact value and not some value truncated modulo a power of ten.
It is a convention of The Long Now Foundation to get people to think of time in terms of 10k years instead of a lifetime at best. It goes hand in hand with their 10k year clock.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock_of_the_Long_Now
I think they are speaking to, not ignorant of, this.
Yes. It’s an artistic choice, about as meaningful as the Hoover artist’s claim that, “There is an angle for doubt, for sorrow, for hate, for joy, for contemplation, and for devotion.” Both have a meaningful denotation in the mind of the creator, but don’t necessarily resonate with others.
> 10k year clock
a.k.a. cuckoo clock
> Just, stop.
Why do you mind what others do?
> A leading zero does not unambiguously say "there are no implied nonzero digits to the left of this zero".
Nor does it anywhere say that it means that or that it should mean that. To me the the leading zero in front of 1931 means “Do you think a thousand year is long? Think on a longer scale.” It is a vibe.
> Or is that the usual truncation of 101931, since most relevant dates are in this decamillennium?
The sentients of 101931 won’t be confused because they will know that 01931 refers to our time. Simply from all the context clues acrued. Such as the fact that the document was written in HTML (an archaic markup format rarely used past 8470 as any historicaly inclined sentient of that age would know) and found saved on an SD—card in the backpack of an astronaut who crash landed on the far side of the moon in 2457. Same as you don’t get confused about which milenia a roman public inscription unearthed in Pompei refers to.
> The sentients of 101931 won’t be confused because they will know that 01931 refers to our time.
They may well be confused, because by then this silly "long now" stuff will be long since forgotten.
Consider that every culture's predominant method of writing has undergone significant changes over a given millennia long period. I'm not about to confuse the date on a photograph of a wax tablet for a modern one.
Their stated aim is to encourage long term thinking. It appears they scored a bullseye with your response.
error: invalid digit '9' in octal constant
Why do you imagine that =1931 wouldn’t be equally confusing in some future decamillenium? Arabic numerals have only been around for (charitably) 0.12 decamillenia. Sorry, =.12 decamillenia.
I just look at it and think someone can't even count to 010 in octal.
> Leading zeros don't do what you think they do
It's has been pretty normal for clocks with digital displays to include leading zeros for seconds, minutes, hours and/or days for about a century. Doing the same for years, while unusual, doesn't seem particularly confusing. And of course, there is precedent with things like ISO86011 - where 0400 is the year 400 CE.
I'm not sure why one would assume it was a truncation of 101931. That doesn't really make much sense. The first decamillennium digit started at 0, just like the first millennium digit started at 0. 101931 would be 99,905 years in the future.
> how people say 03 when they mean 2003
Making people think beyond that form of casual shorthand (even omitting the apostrophe which would indicate the omission!) is sort of the point? Never mind that 03 doesn't necessarily mean 2003.
> I'm not sure why one would assume it was a truncation of 101931.
For the same reason one assumes that 03 refers to 2003 rather than 1903 (or 1803, or ...).
Of course, it's the surrounding historical context that resolves such confusion.
IS086011 or 15O86O11 to be less precise.