this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2024
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Showerthoughts

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why don't people say mega meters (lemmy.world)
submitted 8 months ago by joel_feila@lemmy.world to c/showerthoughts@lemmy.world
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How come people say 5,000 km and not 5 Mm?
why not just say millions of meters or Mega meters?

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[–] takeheart@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

My physics teacher once told us that this was due to the influence of disciplines that calculate with huge masses, say in astrophysics the weight of a planet or the the amount of oxygen within it. Don't know how much of it is true but the basic tenet of everyone preferring the numbers that they work with on a daily basis having as few prefixes as possible as it makes mentally handling and remembering them easier.