Comments on: Friday Fun Poll: Logarithms

By: Juar Vandaful

Juar Vandaful — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 01:34:51 +0000

first of all there are two kinds of people: those who believe that there are two kinds of people.

Considering this it just seems natural that log is log e.

On the other hand it is evident that log is log 10 in most cases, just as 10 is 1010 base 2 and not 2 base 10.

The interpretation of log as log 2 can only be legimitated by context. Otherwise it strongly indicates a case of missinterpretation of the fact that there are two kinds of people.

By: Peter Turney

Peter Turney — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 12:33:04 +0000

(A) There are two kind of people: those who believe that log without a subscript implies base 2 and those who don’t.
(B) There are ten kinds of people: those who understand binary and those who don’t. Clearly, log10 and log2 are the same.
(C) There are three kinds of people: those who believe that log without a subscript implies base e and those who aren’t good at math.

By: Peter

Peter — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 10:23:22 +0000

My measurements do not occupy that many orders of magnitude. I’m more likely to be doing log-likelihood ratio tests or thinking about time constants; natural is the log of choice.

Information-wise, bits are the province of people who think too much about computers. Decibans and nats are clearly more elite.

By: Rew

Rew — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 02:27:29 +0000

Smartass answer:

It rolls down stairs and over chairs and over your neighbor’s dog…

By: C. Birkbeck

C. Birkbeck — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 15:27:54 +0000

Back in high school, my math teacher told me that log = log10, loge = ln and logx = logx.

I don’t see anything wrong with this scheme.

By: Lab Lemming

Lab Lemming — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 11:58:09 +0000

One last serious comment before I classically derail this discussion.

The reason that math people can deal with log = ln while scientists need log = log 10 is this:

Scientists use math to process data, and data are recorded in decimal numbers.

using ln to relate academic equations is fine, but when I log scale my electron multiplier output, what I’m looking for are the order of magnitude- in base 10- of my signal.

Now, that derailment.

Re: Bill’s dibs:

Hitler thought that integer logs were mathemetical constructs of the lesser races.

By: yami

yami — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 00:51:30 +0000

I didn’t want the smartass response to be more appealing than the real ones.

Does it count to be participating in a retro ironic way, if the pop culture phenomenon in which you’re indulging was actually designed with your hipster sensibilities in mind?

By: Bill Tozier

Bill Tozier — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 23:47:44 +0000

I am sure I speak for all Kricfalusi aficionados when I point out that the correct answer, “It’s better than bad, it’s good,” is not represented as a major response in your so-called poll. I would expect Cosma to say as much too, but he’s a heathen Luddite when it comes to television.

We who participate — if only occasionally and in a retro, chichi, ironic way — in the popular culture are becoming increasing ashamed of our know-nothing academic peers.

And dibs on Godwin’s Law, when we reach that stage.

By: Angela

Angela — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 21:12:55 +0000

I use to think of log as base 10 (when not specified), until my first undergrad math class, now I think it is base e unless it is something I know would be base 10 like various science stuff, but usually I write ln if I mean base e, and a subscript for anything else, to avoid confusing myself or others.

By: Lab Lemming

Lab Lemming — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 21:12:53 +0000

I choose a variation of answer 5, a smartass reply for field scientists.

Although I should point out that sedimentology uses log2 for grainsizes.