838: digit Mar 25, 2017

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It is not clear necessarily whether when someone says, 'digit' if that refers to fingers or numbers, unless maybe you are having a conversation with a mathematician or a surgeon. This similarity is not coincidental, though the connection to numbers specifically occurred later. This term comes from the Latin noun, 'digitus' meaning either ‘finger' or 'toe’. The sense of the word as a number from 0 to 9 (or 10) came about due to the practice of counting on the fingers. Not all cultures use a base-ten system of counting, but those that did relied on the number of digits making the association very strong. Fingers also are, among many other things, used for pointing; indeed another term for forefinger or index finger is 'pointer finger'. Unsurprisingly then, the term 'diction' in the sense of telling or showing is related to 'digit'.


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