[3169] in Humor
(fwd) Pinkies are for wimps
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (mmrr)
Sun Apr 16 23:07:35 2000
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Sun, 16 Apr 2000 23:07:16 -0400
From: mmrr <jsmthng@MIT.EDU>
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Subject: Origins of Telecomputing: 2. Prehistoric Data Representation
From: Les Earnest <learnest@pacbell.net>
Reply-To: les@cs.stanford.edu
In the beginning, God created bytes and decided that all information
should be recorded in powers of two. Early life forms embraced this
scheme and divided, though some prefer to think they multiplied. They
later invented sex and proliferated, but a recent construct called man
went astray because of an inherited physical defect. Mankind
eventually learned the natural laws and adapted, though with
difficulty. Fortunately there is a practical way around this
difficulty and it appears that nature will eventually repair the
genetic defect, as discussed further on.
Some people like to think that they live in an analog world, but if we
look closely it is composed entirely of discrete elements and
processes. For example, so-called electronic analog computers are
actually digital devices that count electrons, but do so in such a
sloppy way that they give only a statistical estimate of the answer.
In practice, of course, digital computers have finite precision, which
introduces rounding errors. Some people think that what we call
"reality" is actually a gigantic digital simulation and that so-called
quantum effects are simply the result of rounding errors. I believe
that it is best not to think about that because there is a chance you
will be rounded off!
Worse still, Werner Heisenberg tells us that digital processes have
uncertain outcomes at a more fundamental level and Kurt Goedel has
shown that even if we carry out computations correctly we may not be
able to prove the truth of some things that really are true. What a
mess!
When faced with such adversity, one needs to select a strategy
carefully. The choice made by early life forms was to move ahead and
take credit for things that worked out well while blaming failures on
the designer of this God-awful system.
The oldest known encoding scheme is used in the generative process of
all known life, namely DNA, which is composed of strings of
nucleotides, each consisting of one of four bases: adenine, thymine,
guanine, or cytosine. In computer terms, then, genetic information is
a string of bytes, each having one of four values. Note that these
are God bytes not IBM bytes, which are more than a mouthful.
Genetic mechanisms interpret DNA in three-byte words, called "codons"
by geneticists, each of which specifies one of 20 amino acids or a
"Stop" code. Note that each codon could designate up to 4^3 = 64
actions, but a number of codes yield the same action, leaving just 21
outcomes. The design engineer apparently decided to leave no undefined
codes for use in future products.
One of the earliest inventions came out of collaboration between DNA
and RNA, namely the replication of genetic strings, which made asexual
reproduction possible. Life was good then because every life form had
a shot at immortality. However, there were occasional copying errors
that often resulted in disability or death but occasionally produced
something more robust, thus making a virtue out of flakiness at the
expense of the hapless victims.
One of the greatest inventions, which happened later, was another
binary process called sex. It started a bit weirdly inasmuch as the
sex of individuals was determined not by a sprint between competing
sperm but by environmental factors such as the temperature at which
the egg was incubated. In fact, even today some reptiles use that
scheme and some fish can change sex. The religious right does not
approve, of course, but they were not around when all this was being
worked out.
The big advantage of sex, aside from the rush it produces, is that it
allows desirable genetic traits to be combined from different
individuals. It is just as likely to combine undesirable traits, of
course, which may explain your neighbors, but if you have a ball while
somehow preventing them from reproducing you will be honored by Mr.
Darwin and your descendants.
The big disadvantage of sex is that it means we must die, because in
order for the evolutionary process to work the older life forms must
vacate after their successors have been produced. That is why our DNA
is programmed to kill us. Those who are too immature to accept this
and who think that they can avoid the grim recycler by checking into a
cryogenic hotel are just wasting their money, though they may be
providing a useful benefit to future scientists who will have an
opportunity to dissect earlier life forms.
As the sexual revolution advanced it became more competitive and, in
view of the fact that not all females are monogamous, sperm learned
that instead of having everyone rush toward the goal it paid to use
teamwork. Some became blockers or tacklers, to prevent competitors
from getting through, while others specialized in end runs. As far as
we know they have not yet perfected the forward pass.
While all this elegant competition and binary computation was going on
at lower levels in our biosystem, higher life forms were developing
their own modes of competition and computation, but in spite of
historical precedents not all of was done in powers of two. While it
is possible with practice to carry numbers in our heads, it is often
more convenient to use fingers. Given that our primate heritage left
us with five fingers, our primitive ancestors devised all kinds of
number systems based on multiples of 5. Base 4 would be fine for
participants in the computer age, but 5 is a damn nuisance.
With two hands we get to 10, of course, and with toes we can reach 20.
However, it is hard to move toes one at a time and older people can't
reach that far, so base 10 is the most popular. On the other hand,
twelve is a good number if you wish to be able to divide things up, as
bakery customers often do, because it can be divided into halves,
thirds, quarters, sixths, or twelfths. A gross (a dozen dozen) has
enormous possibilities! The Babylonians somehow chose base 60, which
is 3 * 4 * 5, and stuck us with moderately contorted schemes for
measuring angles and keeping track of time.
In general, powers of two are more convenient for dividing things.
For example, ancient Spanish coins called doubloons, whose name came
from the Latin word for double, were equivalent to four pistoles or
eight escudos and so were also called "pieces of eight." Two of those
pieces, which were a quarter of a doubloon, were called "two bits,"
which migrated into modern slang. Similarly, a gallon is composed of
four quarts, each of which is two pints and milk often comes in half
pints, or one-sixteenth gallon. In the same vein, stock markets have
always used binary fractions for fractional prices. All of these
schemes scale nicely.
However, following an earlier precedent, man began creating
computational tools and machines in his own image, using base 10
arithmetic. Those early inventors didn't realize that they were going
against their own basic nature, given that they had been created "by
the numbers" using base 4 arithmetic.
I have a modest proposal for restoring the balance of nature. Suppose
that instead of performing traditional forms of infant mutilation,
such as binding heads or feet or performing male or female
circumcision, that we simply whack off their pinkies. After all,
little fingers are about as useful as an appendix and they often get
in the way of clear thinking.
Such surgically enhanced children would grow up thinking tetrally or
hexadecimally, as God and IBM intended, and would be much in demand!
They would suffer no significant loss of dexterity as shown by those
to whom this has already happened.
Pinkies have served no practical purpose other than as glove fillers
since our ancestors came down out of the trees. Of course, in order
to do true hexadecimal calculations, tetral individuals would have to
learn to move their fingers binarily rather than as simple counting
devices. Either that or they would also have to get a bilateral
little toectomy and avoid wearing shoes.
An alternative approach would be to use the pinkectomy as a basis for
class distinctions. Under this scheme, only those who are being
inducted into the fraternity of system wizards would have their
surplus digits removed as part of the initiation. This approach seems
to work well among certain Japanese gangsters and would facilitate the
mutual identification of fellow members without having to wear special
rings or to use special handshakes. There should be no confusion with
the gangsters because they mutilate just one hand.
The new elite class would need to have a suitable name, of course. I
recommend against "Hexadecimalists" because that is an etymological
abomination, being a mixture of Greek and Latin roots. The correct
designation is "Sexadecimalists." Believe It or not, the word
"hexadecimal" was concocted by IBM management in the mid-1960s on the
grounds that the correct name for base 16 arithmetic was too
provocative. That is not a myth. A possible rallying cry for the new
order might be "Remove the hex and have more sex!"
In the long run I expect that evolution will fix the problem with our
malformed hands. Pinkies will get progressively shorter through
natural selection, as they have been doing for some time, and will
eventually disappear, thus restoring the balance of nature. Little
toes will probably disappear even sooner.
However, those future developments will probably be irrelevant because
of other evolutionary trends that I plan to discuss much later under
the heading of "Alternative Futures." Yes, I realize that such
projections would be more appropriate on a sci-fi channel rather than
this history channel but perhaps the moderator will let me get away
with it.
Think of it as future history. Just as there may be a number of
alternative interpretations of the past, there may be many alternative
realities in the future. Following quantum principles, they may even
go on concurrently and only later will we find out which one is real,
or at least what we think is real.
-Les Earnest
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