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Study Suggests the Number-Line Concept Is Not Intuitive
An anonymous reader writes "The Yupno people of New Guinea have provided clues to the origins of the number-line concept, and suggest that the familiar concept of time may be cultural as well. From the article: 'Tape measures. Rulers. Graphs. The gas gauge in your car, and the icon on your favorite digital device showing battery power. The number line and its cousins – notations that map numbers onto space and often represent magnitude – are everywhere. Most adults in industrialized societies are so fluent at using the concept, we hardly think about it. We don't stop to wonder: Is it 'natural'? Is it cultural? Now, challenging a mainstream scholarly position that the number-line concept is innate, a study suggests it is learned."
I thought the concept of "ruler" started with King Arthur, after a watery tart lobbed a scimitar at him.
The way that people figured this out is that if five hunters go into a forest as a group, split up and hide. Then one by one, four hunters leave one at a time. The fifth hunter stays in hiding, the monkeys come out of hunting, and the hunter shoots a monkey. This does not happen when there are less than five hunters initially.
I should hope not: if there are four hunters initially, then one by one four hunters leave, there are no hunters left to shoot the monkey. And if there are 3 or fewer hunters initially than the scenario's impossible.
rage, rage against the dying of the light
Bah. Farcical aquatic ceremonies are no basis for a system of measurement.
Use of the number line is derived from a mandate of the masses. Everyone knows that.