Base 12 - Numberphile
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN uses it as the accessible overview of the dozenal system whenever base 12 or the 12 times table comes up.
What it is
Numberphile's James Grime makes the case for base 12 (dozenal) over base 10, showing how twelve's many divisors make arithmetic and everyday fractions easier.
Recommended by 1 HN commenters across 1 different months, 2013 to 2020.
What Hacker News said
Recommends rezashirazian · 2016-01 · on “Is there any point to the 12 times table?”
I came here for this. I am disappointed it is only the third response. I suggest anyone reading this to also watch this video [this video]
Cites snarfy · 2013-12 · on “Show HN: A small (less than 2 kb) CSS framework”
This reminds me of the duodecimal system: [this video] Mathematically, 10 is a pretty arbitrary choice to base your number system on. We would have been better off learning base 12 than inventing metric.
Cites Tistron · 2020-05 · on “Roman Finger Counting”
It's simple enough to Google "etymology eleven" to see that it is a base 10 word. Modern proponents of a dozenal system seem to prefer the words "el" and "doz" for eleven and twelve. I would totally be in for changing, but realistically it'll never happen. Numberphile on the dozenal system: [this video]