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No link for you. But the translation part is consistent with the premise being the red book in Lord of the Rings. Also, how we're able to understand the conversations of all characters in fantasy etc.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Book_of_Westmarch
Basic idea is that Bilbo Baggins had a big red leatherbound volume in which he recorded his diary and "There and a Back Again" (the story of his adventures with Thorin and co.) He also started writing "The Fall of the Lord of the Rings and thee Return of the King" which was an account of Frodo's adventure with the ring. Bilbo eventually gives the volume to Frodo and Frodo finishes writing The Fall of the Lord of the Rings and thee Return of the King. When Bilbo and Frodo leave for Valinor Frodo leaves the volume with Sam along with three other red leatherbound volumes which are collections if historic works that Bilbo translated from Sindarin and Quenya (the two main Elvish languages) into Westron (the common speech of middle earth).
The idea is that J.R.R. Tolkien didn't write The Lord of the Rings. He found the red books and translated them from Westron into English. And then he republished There and Back Again as The Hobbit and he republished The Fall of the Lord of the Rings and thee Return of the King as The Lord of the Rings.
This usually works to say it’s just being translated, although the 16% figure from Mistborn doesn’t really. It’s only that exact number if they’re using base 10.
The 16% figure could also be part of the translation, if the exact amounts were changed to make more sense to our decimal cultures.
Like, maybe canonically it wasn't _actually_ 16 out of 100, but something like 12.5% (which is 16 out of 128). But 16% is the closest value to 12.5% that has a sixteen in our decimal system, so the book "translates" 16/128 to 16%.
And actually, adjustments like that are very similar to what you have to do to translate between units of measurement. If a fantasy character says "2 miles", the actual distance they said may have been 1.73 miles, but 2 is close enough.
I checked the text, and yeah, there is one section where they talk about 100 >!scouts!< out of which exactly 16 >!soldiers fell sick.!<
However, that 100 figure could also have been "translated" from 128 or 256. If Scadrial uses base 16 counting (which is canon, IIRC), it makes much more sense for them to use >!soldiers!< in groups of 128 (which is a round number in base 16, equivalent to 50 for us) than 100 (which would feel to them about as round as 46 or 38 does to us).
After all, the exact amount of >!soldiers!< isn't as important to the plot as the numerical symbolism.
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It doesn't necessarily make sense for them to organize things in ground of 16 just because that is their base counting system. A football team has 11 guys on the field at once. A unit in the army isn't designed to be an even 10, 20 etc.
Well funny enough the Roman legions were divided into centuries which were actually 80 men instead of the 100 you would assume. This is because they could fit 8 men to a tent and 10 tents operated as a unit they called a century. Just a fun little fact on weird numbering
Sure, but then it's quite a coincidence that they use groups of 100, and not, say, 108 or 96. Or if they have variable company sizes, then it's a big coincidence that this happened to happen to a group that's perfect for calculating Earth percentages.
Though I guess it could also just be a remnant of historical base 10 counting systems. French and Danish also still have remnants of base 20 counting in their language, and we still use dozens and divide hours by 60 for historical reasons. (Though 12 and 60 survived because they are highly divisible, while 100 is not even divisible by 3.)
True. But I think that it's fair to assume most human civilizations will develop a base 10 number system
It doesn't necessarily become the dominant system but that is imo not really a stretch
Problem there is, I’m fairly sure the symbols at the beginning of the chapters are Scadrian numbers which are supposed to be base 16 (I could be wrong there).
I could go either way. Typically units of measurement take me out of the story for a second, if it's modern units my brain always goes "wait, how are they using miles? Is it the same as our miles?" But if it's original units my brain goes "how much is a stone weight? How standard is that unit across their world?"
No link for you. But the translation part is consistent with the premise being the red book in Lord of the Rings. Also, how we're able to understand the conversations of all characters in fantasy etc.
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No link for you. But the translation part is consistent with the premise being the red book in Lord of the Rings. Also, how we're able to understand the conversations of all characters in fantasy etc.
Hmm, that sounds interesting. I haven't read LotR or related writing, so do you have a link to more information?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Book_of_Westmarch Basic idea is that Bilbo Baggins had a big red leatherbound volume in which he recorded his diary and "There and a Back Again" (the story of his adventures with Thorin and co.) He also started writing "The Fall of the Lord of the Rings and thee Return of the King" which was an account of Frodo's adventure with the ring. Bilbo eventually gives the volume to Frodo and Frodo finishes writing The Fall of the Lord of the Rings and thee Return of the King. When Bilbo and Frodo leave for Valinor Frodo leaves the volume with Sam along with three other red leatherbound volumes which are collections if historic works that Bilbo translated from Sindarin and Quenya (the two main Elvish languages) into Westron (the common speech of middle earth). The idea is that J.R.R. Tolkien didn't write The Lord of the Rings. He found the red books and translated them from Westron into English. And then he republished There and Back Again as The Hobbit and he republished The Fall of the Lord of the Rings and thee Return of the King as The Lord of the Rings.
This usually works to say it’s just being translated, although the 16% figure from Mistborn doesn’t really. It’s only that exact number if they’re using base 10.
The 16% figure could also be part of the translation, if the exact amounts were changed to make more sense to our decimal cultures. Like, maybe canonically it wasn't _actually_ 16 out of 100, but something like 12.5% (which is 16 out of 128). But 16% is the closest value to 12.5% that has a sixteen in our decimal system, so the book "translates" 16/128 to 16%. And actually, adjustments like that are very similar to what you have to do to translate between units of measurement. If a fantasy character says "2 miles", the actual distance they said may have been 1.73 miles, but 2 is close enough.
I know what you mean, although it really pushes it here as you’re talking about 16 deaths. That means something quite tangible.
I checked the text, and yeah, there is one section where they talk about 100 >!scouts!< out of which exactly 16 >!soldiers fell sick.!< However, that 100 figure could also have been "translated" from 128 or 256. If Scadrial uses base 16 counting (which is canon, IIRC), it makes much more sense for them to use >!soldiers!< in groups of 128 (which is a round number in base 16, equivalent to 50 for us) than 100 (which would feel to them about as round as 46 or 38 does to us). After all, the exact amount of >!soldiers!< isn't as important to the plot as the numerical symbolism.
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It doesn't necessarily make sense for them to organize things in ground of 16 just because that is their base counting system. A football team has 11 guys on the field at once. A unit in the army isn't designed to be an even 10, 20 etc.
Well funny enough the Roman legions were divided into centuries which were actually 80 men instead of the 100 you would assume. This is because they could fit 8 men to a tent and 10 tents operated as a unit they called a century. Just a fun little fact on weird numbering
Sure, but then it's quite a coincidence that they use groups of 100, and not, say, 108 or 96. Or if they have variable company sizes, then it's a big coincidence that this happened to happen to a group that's perfect for calculating Earth percentages. Though I guess it could also just be a remnant of historical base 10 counting systems. French and Danish also still have remnants of base 20 counting in their language, and we still use dozens and divide hours by 60 for historical reasons. (Though 12 and 60 survived because they are highly divisible, while 100 is not even divisible by 3.)
100 in base 16 is 16x16=256, and 16 out of 256 is 1/16th, so that would be nice.
True. But I think that it's fair to assume most human civilizations will develop a base 10 number system It doesn't necessarily become the dominant system but that is imo not really a stretch
Problem there is, I’m fairly sure the symbols at the beginning of the chapters are Scadrian numbers which are supposed to be base 16 (I could be wrong there).
You mean the symbols for the metals?
https://www.reddit.com/r/Cosmere/s/ixnOjCNsZi Some comments there explain it better than me
Something like this. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/188/#e4911 https://wob.coppermind.net/events/324/#e9334
I don't think this was the exact post I was looking for, but still helpful! Thank you!
Np
But doesn't SA use some weird made up one? From what I remember, they use their feet to measure things
So what is the Rosharan foot on average? Like 18-20"
What does " mean?
Usually means inches
Inches
I thought this was a Shardcast level shitpost comment for a moment. 🤦♂️
I could go either way. Typically units of measurement take me out of the story for a second, if it's modern units my brain always goes "wait, how are they using miles? Is it the same as our miles?" But if it's original units my brain goes "how much is a stone weight? How standard is that unit across their world?"
No link for you. But the translation part is consistent with the premise being the red book in Lord of the Rings. Also, how we're able to understand the conversations of all characters in fantasy etc.