Units of Measurement

Substantial postings about constructed languages and constructed worlds in general. Good place to mention your own or evaluate someone else's. Put quick questions in C&C Quickies instead.
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Terra
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Units of Measurement

Post by Terra »

Recently, I made a thread about units and rounding in Ephemera. Naturally, I began to wonder about units in conworlds. What does your conworld use for measurements of length, weight, volume, money, etc? Where do they derive from? Are they standardized? If so, how?, and by who? How are they abbreviated in writing?

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Ulan »

Hmm the only standardized chuj measurements would be very archaic, and be something akin to hexidecimal divisions of how far a messenger could travel in a day, and a smaller scale measurement based on the length of a goat or something similar along with astronomical measurents. But in modern times there would only be rough measurements like 'a tank of gas away' and 'two arm spans wide'


When I switch comps I'll translate those

"dzeeli-nah lin ladaz" / "fucilel ladaz "
Last edited by Ulan on Sun Jun 17, 2012 1:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Carson »

My non human culture doesn't have a system of measurement... yet. Although, I suppose the most likely candidate for a unit of length might be the heights of various trees (they are airborn forest dwellers). So, you could say that 1 Redwood roughly equals 250 feet, or 1 Oak roughly equals (what?) 70 feet.

The human culture that lives outside of that forest in a sort pre-renaissance state, academically. They have fairly developed mathematics--geometry and trigonometry being pretty big, but limits (and therefore Calculus) still a little ways off. So, a standardized system of measurment became necessary to accomplish the various feats of architecture and engineering that they have:
  • Time: 1/60th of 1/60th of 1/24th the time from high noon on summer solstice eve to high noon on summer solstice (so, basically, one second--I didn't feel like blowing up my brain on this one, so I kept it simple)
    Length: 1/8th the distance an object will fall in one second (around a meter and a quarter and picked because a grown man can hold his hands apart and say, "it's ye big"). Aptly called an eigth--and yes, smaller units of measure are referred as fractions of an eigth. A distance equal to the full length that an object drops in a second is called a Fall. I guess I should mention that I've taken acceleration due to gravity to be equivelent to the textbook standard 9.8 m/s^2 (implying a world of similar mass to earth).
    Mass: I forget how they derived that mass and weight are different, but I have units for both... so the unit is equivelant to a block of iron that is about 23 cm to an edge, and is (uncreatively) called an Iron. I don't have my notes to tell you what this is equivalent to in kilograms.
    Weight: very similar, this is set to the weight of a block of silver about 4 cm to an edge (much smaller so that standards can be carried in one's pouch around the marketplace, as merchants will weigh out the amount of currency you give them on a balance in units of, you guessed it, Silvers).
I think I have a unit for capacity, but I don't have my notes with me right now.

These are standardized by the Repository of Natural and Mechanical Sciences in New Rime, where they keep the original blocks of metal used to set the standard and the measuring rod that was cut to precisely 1/8th. These standards are also used to make replicas which can be purchased cheaply and are certified by the Repository as being accurate to measure; the replicas are used throughout the Commonwealth by merchants, traders, engineers, etc. Some merchants buy replicas and then replicate them and sell those replicas, but if they try to forge a certificate they may be jailed--no problem as long as the merchant informs the buyer that they are not Repository-certified.
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Pinetree »

Ulan wrote:Hmm the only standardized chuj measurements would be very archaic, and be something akin to hexidecimal divisions of how far a messenger could travel in a day, and a smaller scale measurement based on the length of a goat or something similar along with astronomical measurents. But in modern times there would only be rough measurements like 'a tank of gas away' and 'two arm spans wide'


When I switch comps I'll translate those

"dzeeli-nah lin ladaz" / "fucilel ladaz "
Wait - They have cars, and they have measurements that vague? How do they have the precision to make usable engine parts?

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Ulan »

KhúbrisInkálkjulabul wrote:
Ulan wrote:Hmm the only standardized chuj measurements would be very archaic, and be something akin to hexidecimal divisions of how far a messenger could travel in a day, and a smaller scale measurement based on the length of a goat or something similar along with astronomical measurents. But in modern times there would only be rough measurements like 'a tank of gas away' and 'two arm spans wide'


When I switch comps I'll translate those

"dzeeli-nah lin ladaz" / "fucilel ladaz "
Wait - They have cars, and they have measurements that vague? How do they have the precision to make usable engine parts?
Cars, trucks, gasoline etc would be an import luxury, but proliferated enough that people would have a rough idea how far that is. There actually might be a small factory to produce parts in the largest city, but it would be closer to replicating components that are imported in. More impoverished areas would still gauge distance on how long it would take by horseback.

A very small minority (those educated outside the country, and the people who would own such plants) would know and use foreign measurements which probably would not be too far from the roman measuring system albeit more modernized.
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by clawgrip »

I posted this in the other thread like this, but I'll post it again since that thread has disappeared:

Swamperian Units of Length:

1 kangjoak (small kang) = 0.4 cm
1 kang weat (half kang) = 2 kangjoak = 0.8 cm
1 kang (or chatkang) = 2 kang weat = 1.6 cm
1 chat = 6 chatkang = 9.6 cm (the basic length of something or other, but I haven't decided what yet)
1 tngual = 12 chat = 115.2 cm
1 tngualpiang (big tngual) = 6 tngual = 691.2 cm

1 heuubnah (short field) = ~3 tngual = 3.125 m - 3.45 m
1 heuu sijik (quarter field) = 10 heuubnah = 31.25 m - 34.5 m
1 heuu weat (half field) = 2 heuu sijik = 62.5 m - 69 m
1 heuu (or heuukleh) (field, field line) = 2 heuu weat = 125 - 138 m (the standard length of a large cultivated field)
1 hurt (or heuu urt, or heuu arngglio) (double field) = 2 heuu = 250 - 276 m

1 tmooay (or tmooaykteu) (run, long run) = ~12 heuu = 1.656 km
1 tmooay arngglio (or tmooay urt) (double run) = 2 tmooay = 3.312 km (distance that can be walked in an as-of-yet undefined, hour-like length of time)
1 tmooay ler gañ (or gañ, or gangkleh) (road run, road, road line) = 3 tmooay arngglio = 9.936 km
1 gangkteu (or gangkleh kteu) (long road, long road line) = 2 tmooay ler gañ = 19.872 km

As you can see, units of length are divided into three categories (kang/chat/tngual, heuu, tmooay/gañ) that are used for different purposes and do not overlap perfectly.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by patiku »

The Turupans being what they are, they use body parts as referents - to indicate a length of around 2'', a Turupan might simply say "my arm" (mem mal), for example. They will also do the same thing with weights.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by clawgrip »

patiku wrote:The Turupans being what they are, they use body parts as referents - to indicate a length of around 2'', a Turupan might simply say "my arm" (mem mal), for example. They will also do the same thing with weights.
How do they measure things like 1 mm, or 2 km, or 50 L?

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Ulan »

clawgrip wrote:
patiku wrote:The Turupans being what they are, they use body parts as referents - to indicate a length of around 2'', a Turupan might simply say "my arm" (mem mal), for example. They will also do the same thing with weights.
How do they measure things like 1 mm, or 2 km, or 50 L?
"my pinky cubed, ? my arm-span cubed?"
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by clawgrip »

We'd better find a place to stay here for the night. It's at least 8500 of my arms to the next town.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by patiku »

Volumes are described with "my fist", "my head", and so on. For large things they'd probably just say "it's far" or "it's a lot".

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by xxx »

I don't have any conworld except inducted by very contrariness language where I can see something that take my mensuration's as measure (normal for idiolect isn't it?).
Each one would have to adapt it in function of one's ones (as ancient regime measurement with king's ones)

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Jerian »

Interesting topic. I haven't put much thought into my conworld's measurements, though I have a brief idea.

In Earth, we have North/South/East/West aimed at two points (magnetic north pole, magnetic south pole)

Dreris does not have this magnetic field Earth does, thus they do not have north/south/east/west. Instead, they have 'adrá', which is a point in the very centre of the two main continents.

As for length: units (which I havent named yet) are the height of the average Drerisian, roughly 1.8 meters (same as Earth, generally).
Volume: units are in buckets (also haven't named). Approx. 1 litre each

time: Drerisian counting is base 5, and everything is built off there. A year is 625 days, (the first 5 digit number)
Drerisian days are roughly 20 Earth hours, and times are measured in decimals.
ie: I'll be there in .25 days.

dates are arranged year.day.time (yes, significant dates in Drerisian history also include time)
example: The last Merantian/Jesinthian war ended on 3685.351.6 .

currency in most kingdoms is valuable rocks, mostly diamonds. Drerisian mining is far, far superior to Earth mining. A marble sized diamond is valued at about $100 (Canadian).



That's all I've got, hope it was interesting.
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Neek »

I've devised some units of measure for Aspharu. Mainly, distance and time.

Let's start with units of distance, shall we? The unit of measure is based on three separate systems: Calligraphic, Corporeal, and Agrarian.
* The Calligraphic units are two: The smallest and second smallest, which is the most common; that is, respectively, a mark (5.86457 mm), four of which make a character (2.3459 cm, or slightly less than inch). Naturalistically, these were based on one small-stroke and one whole character, respectively. The figures have slightly changed after alteration to keep them in proportion to the corporeal and agrarian units.
* Corporeal measures were based on length and relationship of body parts. A palm is made up of 12 marks (7.0377 cm). 4 palms, or 48 marks, makes a cubit (the length of fingertips to elbow), which is equal to 42.2262 cm. 2 cubits, or 12 palms, or 144 marks, is eqal to one pace (84.4524).
* Agrarian measurements were based on stringent surveyor plots: 12 paces should make a store (10.1343 m); 12 stores make a field (121.611 m), and 12 fields make a "mile" (1.45934 km). This mile is equal to 1/32,678th of the planet's circumference. This fraction is important: There are 32,678 seconds in the day. It is also the distance the sun moves overhead in one second.

So, we know there are 32,678 seconds in a day. Each "second" is equal to about 3 of seconds, and there are 256 per "minute" (which is equal to 12:39 minutes); 16 "minutes" make an "hour" (3:22:33). And 4 "hours" (13:30:00) is equal to one half-day, or positon. Two positions makes a full day, so a day is equal about to 27 of our hours.

It is interesting to note that distance is based on a 12-base system (as we can see in the agrarian system); that is, all units of measure past palm are evenly divisble by 1, 2, 3, and 4. The time system, however, is based on a 16-base system, wherein all units from position down are evenly divisible by 2 (and are in fact exponentials of 2).

The calendar system is less fun: There are 20 months to a year, each month alternating from 24 and 23. There are 5 months per season. Months, whether 24 day or 23 day, are divided into inferior and superior counting, much like how the early position of the day is considered inferior and the later position of the day is considered superior. Days aren't generally named except for the first day of the month (the inferior day), halfway through the inferior position, the onset of the superior position, and halfway through the superior position (which on 24-day months, the semi-inferior day is on the 7th, the superior day is on the 13th day, and the semi-seperior day is the 18th day; 23-day months are different: 6th, 11th, and 17th respectively).

Years are counted in three different cycles based on a system of 7s: There are 7 years, 7 houses, two positions. Years count up, after the 7th year, the house position moves up. After the 7th year in the 7th position in the inferior position, it moves to the superior position. The largest count of years then is 196 years. Larger collections are indicated by a number: 3rd cycle of the Age of Mortal Kings, for instance. The count of 196 years is based on the syncronicity to the nearest-closest planet. It'll take 196 years for this planet to appear in the same spot in the sky on the same day.

The years/houses are as follows (the year is before the slash, the house after). Years are named after animals, while houses are named after plants (specifically nationally celebrated animals and plants)
1 - Bull / Barley
2 - Narwhal / Rice
3 - Wasp / Hydrangea
4 - Mountain Lion / Hyacinth
5 - Bear / Cedar
6 - Raptor / Oak
7 - Wolf / Tobacco

Date/time is displayed largest to smallest. Short and long forms of the date are based on descriptiveness, but the order is still the same.
(Era)(Cycle count):Position:House:Month:Day(*)Position:Hour:Minute:Second
* After the date, one can put in a full-stop, space, or the equivalent of a colon. There's no real standardization.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by masako »

This is a very inspirational thread.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Salmoneus »

clawgrip wrote:We'd better find a place to stay here for the night. It's at least 8500 of my arms to the next town.
Rather than 8500 strides, or 20000 feet?
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Jadyndar »

I've got five sets of traditional Anhrüshite units, one each for weight, length, liquid capacity, dry capacity and time. I imagine that the Anhrüshites have since moved on to a more SI-like system (they're presently at a near-future tech level), keeping only the traditional units for time, but I haven't worked any such system out yet. Going through each type of measure, with the base units underlined...

Weight (and presumably mass, once the Anhrüshites figured out that they aren't the same)

nøn (Gomain: grain) ~= .06921 g
ogam (coin) = 192 nøna, 13.288 g (originally the weight of a silver coin)
glŕtsĩ (weight) = 24 ogama, 318.92 g
zheich (rod) = 72 glŕtsina, 22.962 kg
ünggjanngŕt (two-gross-weight) = 6 zheicha, 137.77 kg
kŕdzonüs (big heavy thing) = 36 ünggjanngŕta, 4,959.8 kg

Length

darwazë (little finger) = 1.69333... cm
podaus (handbreadth) = 9 darwaza, 15.24 cm
üngkaifwas (half-man-width) = 6 podausa, 91.44 cm
ohweich (arena) = 576 üngkaifwasa, 526.69 m
auanüs (big long thing) = 6 ohweicha, 3,160.2 m

Liquid Capacity

dhendar (thimble) = 5.4 mL
dhem (cup) = 12 dhendara, 64.8 mL
dhon (mug) = 8 dhema, 388.8 mL
ru (vessel) = 8 dhona, 3.1104 L
kjelthet (bath) = 48 ruha, 149.2292 L

Dry Capacity

thum (box) = 455.2 mL
karím (bowl) = 4 thuma, 1.8208 L
rÿzzo (dry vessel) = 6 karíma, 10.925 L
rus (big vessel) = 4 rÿzzoha, 43.699 L

Time

aunë (second) = .78125 s
zhoi (minute) = 72 auna, 56.25 s
ängkra (hour) = 72 zhoia, 67.5 min
räng (day) = 24 ängkraha, 27 hr
jurp (week) = 7 ränga (not too thrilled with this word's lack of any apparent relationship to räng, probably going to change it)
khar (month) = 35-37 ränga (based on the synodic period of Askath's larger, more distant moon; only one month has 37 days, and just for religious reasons)
hwök (year) = 12 khara, 426 or 427 ränga, also ~480.127 Earth days
Further details on the Anhrüshite calendar are included in the Gomain reference grammar
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by mèþru »

Jerian wrote:Dreris does not have this magnetic field Earth does, thus they do not have north/south/east/west. Instead, they have 'adrá', which is a point in the very centre of the two main continents.
Cardinal directions can be defined in other ways than magnetism. Even before magnetism was discovered, ancients had words for north/south/east/west, and, as long as your world has two or more dimensions, I don't see why you should have only two directions (of course, instead of north/south/east/west, you could use north/antinorth/east/antieast).
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by vec »

mèþru wrote:
Jerian wrote:Dreris does not have this magnetic field Earth does, thus they do not have north/south/east/west. Instead, they have 'adrá', which is a point in the very centre of the two main continents.
Cardinal directions can be defined in other ways than magnetism. Even before magnetism was discovered, ancients had words for north/south/east/west, and, as long as your world has two or more dimensions, I don't see why you should have only two directions (of course, instead of north/south/east/west, you could use north/antinorth/east/antieast).
Speaking of cardinal directions, the Uscans use only three, east, northnorthwest and southsouthwest. It then has secondary directions, anti-east (west), anti-northnorthwest (southsoutheast) and anti-southsouthwest (northnortheast).
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by xxx »

Cardinal directions can be defined in other ways than magnetism.
The cardinal points are anterior to the invention of magnetism, and according to the observation of the sun...
The lure of heliocentrism tries, without succeeding, to make less obvious this folk definition...
We do not always have a compass, often eyes...

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by Akangka »

Jerian wrote: In Earth, we have North/South/East/West aimed at two points (magnetic north pole, magnetic south pole)

Dreris does not have this magnetic field Earth does, thus they do not have north/south/east/west. Instead, they have 'adrá', which is a point in the very centre of the two main continents.
Reminds me of the messy Austronesian directions.

[quote:"Wikipedia"]
The Proto-Austronesians used two types of directions, which are the land-sea axis and the monsoon axis. The cardinal directions of north, south, east, and west developed among the Austronesian languages only after contact with the Europeans. For the land-sea axis, upstream/uphill and inland, as well as downstream/downhill and seaward, are synonym pairs. This has been proposed as evidence that Proto-Austronesians used to live on a mainland, since the sea would be visible from all angles on small islands.

*daya: inland (also upstream/uphill)
*lahud: seaward (also downstream/downhill)
*SabaRat: west monsoon
*timuR: east monsoon
*qamiS: north wind
Interestingly, in Kavalan, Amis, and Tagalog, the reflexes of *timuR mean "south" or "south wind," while in the languages of the southern Philippines and Indonesia it means "east" or "east wind."

In Ilocano, dáya and láud respectively mean "east" and "west," while in Puyuma, ɖaya and ɭauɖ respectively mean "west" and "east." This is because the Ilocano homeland is the west coast of northern Luzon, while the Puyuma homeland is located on the eastern coast of southern Taiwan. Among the Bontok, Kankanaey, and Ifugaw languages of northern Luzon, the reflexes of *daya mean "sky" due to the fact that they already live in some of the highest elevations in the Philippines (Blust 2009:301).

Also, the Malay reflex of *lahud is laut, which means "sea", used as directions timur laut (means "northeast", timur = "east") and barat laut (means "northwest", barat = "west"). Meanwhile *daya only performs in barat daya, which means "southwest".

On the other hand, the Javanese reflex of *lahud, lor, means "north" since the Java Sea is located to the north of the island of Java.
[/quote]

For people that uses the sea a lot, they should abandon *daya and *lahud, because it would be useless in sea (Which island?There is many islands near here!). Austronesian includes both of my native languages, Javanese and Indonesian.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by din »

I'm glad this thread came back around (again), because it gave me a reason to give this topic some thought. I've come up with the following measurement units for the Miott, so far. I've yet to consider things like weight and volume.

With the introduction and adoption of the metric system, the units have been officially rounded to the nearest half unit of a metric equivalent. The internal proportions were fully preserved.

_____________________
Distance:

Liâmo – Officially 4.5 km = 3 ogidin = 3000 dattan, but informally the distance which can be traveled in an hour (especially by foot). Also used to say that something is reasonably far away. The word literally means 'that which is laid' in the modern language, or 'a stretch'.

Ogid – Officially 1.5 km = 1000 dattan. The word literally means 'a rest', and is the distance after which one might take a rest when walking.

Datt – Officially 1.5 m = 6 pagan. It is equal to a double footstep. The word simply means 'step' or 'pace'.

Pag – Officially 25 cm. The word means foot, and the unit is similar (but shorter) to 1 foot, and closer to the average human foot. It is not used for stating the height of people or structures. The measurements under 'size' below are used for this instead.

Miccec – Officially 100 pagan = 25 m. The word means 'chain', and much like the traditional English chain, it was traditionally made of 100 links of chain, each a foot long (or a pag long, in this case).

_____________________
Size:

Capascor – Officially 180 cm = 4 dinnippin. The word is composed of the prefix capa- (pushed away from) and scor (chest), and refers to the arms being spread out from the chest. The unit is very similar to the fathom, in the sense that it is based on the distance between the tips of the middle fingers when the arms are outstretched next to the body.

Dinnipp or less commonly dilnipp – Officially 45 cm = 2 onioppon. This unit is similar to the ell, the length of the forearm down to the extended middle finger. The word means 'elbow' (or more literally, 'arm bump').

Oniopp – Officially 22.5 cm = 2 soron. The word literally means 'to tense' or 'to stretch'. The unit is very similar to the English span.

Sor – Officially 11.25 cm = 10 derhen = 5 athen. The word literally means 'palm', but is not the width of the palm, as the traditional English measurement. It is based on the distance from the base of the pinkie to the middle of the base of the thumb (at the trapezium joint), on a hand with all fingers drawn close together.

Athe – Officially 2.5 cm = 2 derh. The word means 'mother' or 'aunt', but instead refers to the thumb or big toe (teuaiathe, which literally means 'mother finger'). As such, it is very close to the inch.

Derh – Officially 1.125 cm = 10 cairan. The word simply means 'nail', and the unit refers to the width of the fingernail of the index finger.

Cair – Officially 1.125 mm, or a tenth of a derh. The word literally means 'scratch'

_____________________
Area:

Manad – Officially 1 square miccec = 625 m². The traditional size of a field, which is also the meaning of the word. Smaller units based on this include manad opener ('half a field'), which is ½ square miccec (12.5m x 12.5m), or 50×50 pagan; as well as the manad lohor ('small field'), which is a full miccec around the circumference, for example 25×25 pagan.
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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by KathTheDragon »

Just wanted to point out that your areas are inaccurate: 1 square miccec is actually 625 m², since it is a square of side 1 miccec = 25 m. Also, is your manad opener is meant to be half the area, or half the side? It's not entirely clear. If the former, it would be approximately 70.7 pagan on a side.

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by din »

KathTheDragon wrote:Just wanted to point out that your areas are inaccurate: 1 square miccec is actually 625 m², since it is a square of side 1 miccec = 25 m. Also, is your manad opener is meant to be half the area, or half the side? It's not entirely clear. If the former, it would be approximately 70.7 pagan on a side.
Yes, you're absolutely right of course. I meant 25 x 25, or 625 m2. It was 2 AM when I posted.

The manad opener is what I described: 50 x 50 pagan, so half a miccec squared. That indeed is not half a manad in area. I've changed the description to make it clearer.

Thanks for letting me know!
— o noth sidiritt Tormiott

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Re: Units of Measurement

Post by GreenBowTie »

measurement is man's attempt to understand, explain, and control god's creation, which is a sin

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