Numbers in the World's Languages
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- Опубліковано 13 чер 2024
- Around the World, languages use a variety of ways to express numbers. This video introduces many of the basic features of numeral systems worldwide, from bases to classifiers.
Some References from my research (very interesting):
Zaslavsky, C. and Clarke, J.H. (1999) Africa counts: Number pattern in African culture. Chicago: Lawrence Hill Books.
Dunn, M. J. (1999). A grammar of chukchi. Australian National University.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:13 Base
04:48 Origin of Bases
08:43 Sub-Bases
11:46 Writing Bases
16:55 Parts of Speech
18:12 Types of Number
20:45 Different Objects
21:25 Classifiers
22:36 Outro
Base 23 is wild! Even base 27 is making more sense.
It is very unusual! Maybe I should learn more about that language, as it feels like having such a high prime number base should be quite impractical! :)
@@LexisLang Only after I wrote that I saw the 37 base based on body parts (the guy didn't look like your typical Papoea though🤭) You think the 23 base is also based on body parts? Is every number system based on body parts? 12 and 60 just seem practical, although the latter's a bit big.
"the guy didn't look like your typical Papoea though" - No, worked with what I had :)
From what I can tell, Kobon at least actually uses a body-part system, like Foi. I didn't realise that at the time of making the video, so perhaps it's inaccurate to call it base-23. I believe the same applies for Telefol (base-27).
English used to be a base 12 language. That's why we have separate names for "eleven" and "twelve". Rather than saying "oneteen" or "tweteen". Same for many western Indo-European languages. It makes me wonder where the base 10 system started from. My first assumption is that we borrowed it from Arabic because they gave us the numbers, but I wouldn't know where to begin researching that specifically.
Actually, English has always been base-10. Proto-Indo-European, the oldest known ancestor of English was base ten and there is no mainstream history of the language using base-12. "Eleven" and "twelve" originally meant "one left over" and "two left over" (after the important number of ten). I don't believe it's known why this is, but 12's divisibility and usefulness has been known for millennia - Roman fractionals were base 12, for instance. It's probably this and how frequent 11 and 12 are compared to higher numbers that's why it's so prevalent. Of course, it could be that Pre-PIE, there was some B-12 usage, or perhaps one of the pre-IE languages of Europe gave contact phenomena, but if so, most of the evidence of this has been lost.
Arabic numerals came to Europe in the 10th century, but weren't common until the 15th. Given all the written documents we have before this time which use base-10, it can't have been the influence of Arabic giving us this system. Besides, Arabic numerals are descended from the numerals of ancient India, originally used by the Indo-Aryans, who are also Indo-European, so they used base-10 too.
Sorry for the ramble. This is just such a fascinating topic - thanks for bringing it up. If anyone ever writes a paper or dissertation or whatever on this, I'd love to see it. :)
Thank you, very informative and well presented.
Thank you for watching! I'm very glad you enjoyed it! :)
17 is the most random number anyway and no number base will change it
Well, I guess except in base 17, but then literally every other number is really random. :)
@@LexisLang yeah but literally every other number has something for it. If it's an even number it doesn't feel THAT random, and literally every odd number makes me think of another number, either a multiplication or something else, EXCEPT 17. There is no number more random than 17 and that is final
Very informative and interesting stuff. Thank you
You're welcome! Thank you for watching! :)
10, 12, 20, & 60 are different ways of finger counting, as you have described
That's right. :)
You have 333 subscribers and the video has 3 likes (I was the third like)
That is very nice! I'm glad you enjoyed the video! Just a shame it doesn't really work in other bases... "GD" doesn't quite have the same ring to it :P
Not any more!
Wolof 10.. giggity
Pardon?
@@LexisLang nothing :).. just. a 13 year old boy in me giggles when seeing the Wolof number words... awesome vid though (french is weird ammirite)
Ah. Thank you for watching! Glad you enjoyed! French, definitely weird. It's very interesting and nice seeing why it's like that, but definitely seems weird at first. :)
Listening to you was pure torture, why are you speaking like that, as if isn't bad enough that you have a fake video title
I'm just speaking normally. Also not sure what's 'fake' about the title. Thank you for leaving a comment, though! :)
Hello, Lexis. I know your channel is small now but I'm sure it will grow fast some day. It would be great chatting about linguistics and nerdy stuff! I'd recommend sharing some kind of contact media. Thank you for your educative content. ♥️🫂
Hi! I'm glad you like my stuff! I am growing very slowly. I've listed my email on the "about" tab of my channel page (you may have to do a captcha to see it, dk), so if ever you want to get in touch, feel free to use that.
I'm not a big fan of social media, so I'm not on much, but maybe eventually I'll create some official accounts to use and make chatting easier. I would like to cultivate a little community here and I hope that'll develop as I grow, but I have big plans for if I ever do get bigger.
As I'm sure you can tell, I'm a big fan of nerdy stuff, so I'm always happy to discuss either here or elsewhere. Thank you so so much for your support! :D