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Creazle@lemmy.world to Lemmy Shitpost@lemmy.world – 777 points –
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Wait until you hear what the Danes do.

Why is “97” “7 + [-½+5] x 20” in Danish?

https://jose-lesson.com/lin/2017/01/16/nonaginta-septem/

Normal children usually gain fluency in their native language by age 5. Danish children need to wait until age 7.

It's kind of funny how aware Danes are of their weird numbers system. I speak Norwegian and whenever I'm in Denmark they use the more sensible Norwegian number system to explain to me the prices of stuff (probably because I give them the deer in the headlights-stare whenever I hear something like "fem og halvfjerds").

I'm otherwise decently fluent in Danish (first learned nynorsk then lived in Denmark for a few years). But when numbers come out I immediately switch back to Norwegian. Fucking Danes.

They think we're stupid and infantile for evolving past tradition.

No kidding. It's the sort of thing that makes you think about how different people process info differently

TIL that there's actually (kinda but not really) a method to the madness that is our numbers 😄

Thanks for the link! While I was aware of the weird numbers in Danish, this gave a great explanation and I wish I had had this info when I was forced to learn French in school. The way this vigntisian system evolved is actually quite interesting and makes so much sense. Everything makes sense now. Wow.