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Re: USAGE: Well, at least he created numbers.....

From:Tristan Alexander McLeay <anstouh@...>
Date:Thursday, January 24, 2002, 12:07
On Wed, 23 Jan 2002, Muke Tever wrote:

> From: "John Cowan" <jcowan@...> > > Clint Jackson Baker wrote: > > > > > Then how would the Englishman, Australian, Nigerian, > > > et al say those numbers? I don't know of any > > > distinction among English speakers, except that some > > > use "and" to separate the tens and ones from > > > everything else, eg "five hundred and thirty two", > > > "four thousand and nine". Is this what you mean? > > > > > > Just so, and I should have said as much. I think > > it was around 1950 when the "one hundred twenty three" > > style, without the traditional "and", became commonly > > taught in North America.
Do you know why they decided to replace convention with something unusual?
> Well, when I was in school, I was taught that "and" goes for the decimal point: > four thousand and nine [tenths].
I say point for the decimal point or and before a fraction: 'four thousand point nine'; 'four thousand and nine tenths'. This sounds quite dangerous, if we can't all agree on how to use numbers... Tristan