20 April 2024

Very interesting event in downtown Alpharetta

After shopping for fresh vegetables, we ran into a bunch of tents that were being set up in Brooke Street Park. There was a surprisingly large number of young kids there. Went to investigate.

Turns out it was Childrens’ Entrepreneur Market. Apparently this is a new thing started in downtown Alpharetta this year. Lots of very young kids had their parents set up the tents so they could sell stuff they had made. Some were fairly interesting and some not so much.

But loved their willingness to take the initiative.

Best was one young girl who had come prepared with a board where she had written “Sorry! We are sold out!!” Loved the confidence. Loved the thinking around the corner.

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Category: Downtown Activities | LEAVE A COMMENT
16 April 2024

Why the heck do we write 4 that way?

Given my love for numbers, lately I have started reading a book on where do our senses for numbers come from? Do animals understand numbers? (They do – but not the way we think). Does a child of 2 months understand the difference between 2 and 3? (You will be surprised!!)

Now I am trying to figure out why is it that in most cultures, we write 2 by repeating 1 in some fashion. Same for 3. But when it gets to 4, we go a very different way. And all cultures have uniformly decided to take a fork while representing 4.

The Roman notation is the most unintuitive. After denoting 2 as nothing but two of 1 and 3 as three of 1, to denote 4, first it introduces 5 !!! And then the understanding of subtraction!!

Why did they do that?

Category: Books | LEAVE A COMMENT