One is One...Or Is It?

Today I watched a very brief TED talk about the number 1 and units of measurement.

The video's only 3 minutes long, which means by the time you finish reading this post, you could have watched the whole thing.

Christopher Danielson wonders about the number one, and when is it singular and when is it part of a whole?

Best quote: "Think about toaster pastries: they come in packs of 2, then they get put together in sets of 4 to make a box, so when I buy 1 box of toaster pastries am I buying 1 thing, 4 things, or 8 things?"

As someone with no love of math, I wish teachers had posed questions like this to me at an early age. I don't think skill factors into academia nearly as much as general curiosity- if I could have only developed an  interest in math I would have had the desire to get better and understand it more.

Oh well, I'm not an old dog yet, no reason to think I can't fall in love with math now.

You can watch it here:

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