My daughter just came through, asking me how many feet are in a mile. Crud. I don't remember.
I shuffle my feet (figuratively, since I'm seated) and mutter something like, "Oh, I don't remember. That's something you memorize in elementary math, and I should probably remember it, but I don't. Let me look it up."
Two seconds later I furnish her with the answer, which I've just googled and found on AskNumbers.com:
"How many feet in a mile? If you are referring to statute (land) mile as commonly used today (road signs etc), the answer is 5280 feet."
[They're number-types, so we'll excuse the punctuation errors, as we hope they'll forgive us grammar-types for not knowing the numerical conversion in the first place!]
I also found the following Einstein quote, too, which I found interesting:
“Einstein was once asked how many feet are in a mile. Einstein's reply was, 'I don't know. Why should I fill my brain with facts I can find in two minutes in any standard reference book?'"
I wonder if he ever envisioned the world we live in, where the two minutes in the standard reference book has been replaced with two seconds on the Internet?
I shuffle my feet (figuratively, since I'm seated) and mutter something like, "Oh, I don't remember. That's something you memorize in elementary math, and I should probably remember it, but I don't. Let me look it up."
Two seconds later I furnish her with the answer, which I've just googled and found on AskNumbers.com:
"How many feet in a mile? If you are referring to statute (land) mile as commonly used today (road signs etc), the answer is 5280 feet."
[They're number-types, so we'll excuse the punctuation errors, as we hope they'll forgive us grammar-types for not knowing the numerical conversion in the first place!]
I also found the following Einstein quote, too, which I found interesting:
“Einstein was once asked how many feet are in a mile. Einstein's reply was, 'I don't know. Why should I fill my brain with facts I can find in two minutes in any standard reference book?'"
I wonder if he ever envisioned the world we live in, where the two minutes in the standard reference book has been replaced with two seconds on the Internet?
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