this post was submitted on 24 May 2024
1180 points (97.6% liked)

Science Memes

10377 readers
3065 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.


Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago (1 children)

The most reliable way to communicate bases would probably be using unary. Now if your alien is using unary, that might not work, but it should for all higher bases.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

I'm not sure if I fully understand.
I was thinking, wouldn't it be easiest to describe the system you use by taking the last number in your first decimum and then saying you increment it with one?
E.g. for base ten this would be: base 9 + 1
For binary it would be: base 1 + 1
For hexadecimal it would be: base F + 1
Etc.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

But if you're talking to an alien that uses base 4, they don't know what you mean by "base 9+1". Wtf is a 9?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Yes. Although at least you will both be aware that you are using different systems