It's a different planet.

[Bill Phil]

So why do we as humans have base 10 and not base 8 numbers?

QEFail.

Because we have ten fingers. The word "finger" stems from a word that means "five". They didn't have a separate word, they just used the number.

- - - Updated - - -

IIRC, the meter is based on the speed of light. So it is universal.

The meter is based off of the speed of light and our time system. A meter is the distance light travels in 1/c seconds. Who's to say they would have seconds? Or any length of time that's close? they could divide it into hundredths, making the meter a different size. (I know, their time is technically the same as ours, just 6 hours instead of 24, but the meter is hardly universal around the universe).

[Jethro420]

Aren't all seagoing ships' throttles (called telegraphs, I believe) divided into thirds?

Not sure why. But, it's been that way since the first steamships.

Edited March 2, 2015 by Jethro420

[whiterafter]

Or maybe harvester just decided to use third?

[thadisjones]

Aren't all seagoing ships' throttles (called telegraphs, I believe) divided into thirds?

Not sure why. But, it's been that way since the first steamships.

"Ahead" is actually five speeds, though not exactly divided into five parts! The first three are in thirds, with STAND meaning Standard Speed, the point at which the vessel attains the greatest forward speed for a certain fuel efficiency. Full is greatest sustainable speed, and Flank is approximately the nonsustainable, possibly destructive emergency speed, as in "toss in the turpentine" or "give her all she's got, Scotty".

I think from the nautical point of view there simply wasn't a need for a finer speed gradient than thirds, and some units divided the first three bells into SLOW HALF and STAND, and on some ships it was practice to call the engine room and request a specific RPM when using anything under standard anyway which would have allowed for a 1/4 or 3/4 standard speed if anyone so wanted.

I have no idea what this has to do with KSP though.

[Flef]

I've finally figured out why the throttle is divided into thirds instead of quarters. Until now, it seemed to me the throttle should look more like this:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/78157466/forum%20posts/KSP%20throttle.PNG

with four major divisions. But the stock game has it divided into thirds. Never knew why, until it occurred to me this morning...

Like most of our cartoon characters, kerbals have only three fingers on each hand. So they would necessarily have a different numbering system. They're counting in trinary; base-3. Like this:

0, 1, 2,

10, 11, 12, 20, 21, 22,

100, 101, 102, 110, 111, 112, 120, 121, 122, 200,

etc.

Using a base-3 number system, requires a lot more digits than base-10. So, until the invention of writing, (which finally occurred centuries after space flight) kerbals would frequently use their toes for any number larger than 22₃. Using toes to count while standing or walking is obviously difficult, so it would be socially acceptable during technical conversations to frequently fall down. Which also explains their hapless and accident-prone culture. Q.E.D.

The true question is... do you often go above 100%?

[rdwulfe]

Reminds me of a series I read in middle school, "The Tripod Trilogy" I think. The creatures had three limbs and counted everything in base-3. Very interesting concept to think about.

Off topic: I remember that series, Slam. VERY good series, found it years later and re-read it. Hah. I still remember the name of one of the books. I may have to refind it again, thank you for reminding me of it.

Less so:

If I remember right, the Mayans used base 20.

[Tanner Rawlings]

well considering they have 8 countable digits, it is assumed they count in base 8 or base 4 (most likely base 8, which will cut down the number of symbols i need for my custom kerbal language writing) but maybe the kerbals were more into fractions and irrational numbers and went with a base 12 system thus explaining the 4 point throttle, or even crazier is (im going Koo Koo for kerbal puffs here) that since the throttle has 15 points all together they use a base 15 system, and they count by counting all 4 digits on one hand in a binary fashion. (one finger extended being zero, i mean they arent human so whos to say they will use logic like ours, [points to exploding rocket as example]) well im going to go fantasize about maths in kerbal base 15

Edit

the reasoning behind the extra marks above "15" is to show how much they are over exerting the ship and so (assuming its the standard system for gauges on kerbin) anyone can look and see "oh darn, its gonna blow"

Edited March 4, 2015 by Tanner Rawlings

[helaeon]

Considering the OP's picture they should be on base 8... which actually has some interesting physics implications. I remember when I was in physical chemistry that sometimes the best way to solve certain equations was to do everything in base 8 rather than base 10. What those things were I do not remember. A lot of things we did in physical chemistry we did to show we could rather than it being incredibly important, or to prove the real truth of something over the convenient simple lies we were told in earlier classes.

This would have some computing implications as well, as Oct is a good alternative to Hex. The computing implications are all based on powers of two and some physics necessities for organizing memory and storage efficiently. Base 8 math naturally comes out of it.

A base 8 system would serve kerbals very, very well.

[rockbloodystar]

There are 10 kinds of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.

And those who mistake binary for tertiary.

[Zephram Kerman]

Considering the OP's picture they should be on base 8... which actually has some interesting physics implications. I remember when I was in physical chemistry that sometimes the best way to solve certain equations was to do everything in base 8 rather than base 10. What those things were I do not remember. A lot of things we did in physical chemistry we did to show we could rather than it being incredibly important, or to prove the real truth of something over the convenient simple lies we were told in earlier classes.

This would have some computing implications as well, as Oct is a good alternative to Hex. The computing implications are all based on powers of two and some physics necessities for organizing memory and storage efficiently. Base 8 math naturally comes out of it.

A base 8 system would serve kerbals very, very well.

I'm guessing you used base 8 in chemistry for things involving valences. It's pretty handy for computer math too, being akin to the hardware yet much more compact and intuitive than binary.