The tenth digit

[HungLikeJesus]

How many of you are comfortable with our current counting system? You know, 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, etc.

This is something that's been drilled into us for so long that it seems normal, natural, not to be questioned. And what's wrong with that?

Here's an example. Get a sharpie, or other permanent marker. Starting with the pinkie of the left hand, number each of your fingers, including the thumbs. Left pinkie - 1. Left ring finger - 2. And so on. Left thumb - 5, right thumb - 6...

What happens when you get to your right pinkie? Right pinkie is 10 - that takes two digits! It's just not right.

There are other problems with the number 10, and its multiples. For example, most people think that 20 is the bottom of the twenty series. It's not - it's the top of the teens. And 30 is the top of the twenties. It's crazy. But what can we do?

I would suggest that we adopt a single digit representing 10. What will we call it? How about ten? What should it look like? Maybe this: þ. It's like a 1 and 0 combined into one digit.

With the new digit þ we can almost completely eliminate use of the dreaded zero (but not completely).

Counting in new digit is almost the same as counting in old digit:
1,2,...,9,þ, 11, 12, ... ,19,1þ (tenteen), 21, ..., 29, 2þ (twenty-ten), 31

Counting in old digit, we have 9 one-digit numbers, 90 2-digit numbers, 900 3-digit numbers, etc.

Counting in new digit, we will have 10 1-digit numbers, 100 2-digit numbers (from 11 to þþ), and so on.

Doesn't that just feel right?

Rather than present derivation of decimals and negative numbers, I'll leave those as exercises for the reader.