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Comment by billforsternz | Hacker News Reader

I'm triggered every time I see things like "$663,937.02 today". I just can't help it. There should be a word for [mindlessly] reporting the results of a calculation to arbitrary precision when only one significant digit of precision is warranted. There probably is such a word in German.

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You and me both! When I see something like "a blue whale can be nearly 100 feet (30.48m) long", I want to throw a math book at the author. "Nearly 100 feet" is "nearly 30 meters". "About $250K" is "about $660K today" at best.

Yes, my comment implied "about $700K" since I said one significant digit, but I have no problem at all with "about "$660K" especially when you add "at best" as you did :-). In general I think these inflation estimators are inherently very imprecise across multi decade timespans because the societal changes that occur over long periods of time mean you inevitably are comparing apples to oranges.

Not to mention the number of times you see geographical locations specified to nanometer precision.

https://xkcd.com/2170/

My favourite is "average July temperatures have increased by 2°C (35.6°F)".

My favorite is 98.6F - your whole perspective changes when you realize that it's actually 37C.

Should be 1/4 M$, 2/3 M$.

It's almost like everyone should just adopt the system of units and measurements that makes the most sense and is used by the very, VERY vast majority of the world.

Also true but not relevant here. That original example of overly precise dollar amounts would still be an issue. The root cause isn’t units, but innumeracy.

Sure, that example would still exist, but the example of C to F and Meters to Feet would be gone forever. Add in Miles to Kilometers, pounds to kilograms and all the rest and you've reduced the problem space dramatically.

Another issue is that computer prices are really hard to compare across time, especially for systems targeted at businesses. Do you just use the CPI? Why is that meaningful? Do you use the one for IT? (Then it would be like, "$250,000 in 1989 ($1,400 today)") Something in-between? How do you capture the notion that workstations of this era were basically the first generation that allowed businesses to computer-aid stuff they used to do on paper, bringing a massive productivity boost?

Überpräzisionsberichterstattung

Google Translate accepts it, so I guess it's a word. Only one Google result though (this page).

Google Translate just understands how German allows "on the fly" compound words. E.g. it knows "Überpräzisionsberichterstattunghundhund" is " "Over-precision reporting dog dog" not because it's anymore a word than other nonsense but just because it's what it would mean if you made it up.

Sometimes you just gotta love the German language. We joyfully smash words together to make new words, like a linguistic particle accelerator. :-)

Would be possible but seems overcomplicated. Why not just "Überpräzisierung"? This is actually in use.

Maybe, haven't heard it IRL though. As opposed to the more vague 'Übergründlich'.

That’s when someone takes ages to e.g. clean something up because they are using way more effort than necessary.

As a German, I won't say "doesn't exist" because it's possible of course. At best, people would think it some term from legalese.

The opposite thing though, "really roughly approximately (and couldn't care less how precise)" (you get what I mean) is often colloquially used in German, under the term "Pi times Thumb" (Pi mal Daumen).

So yes you can say "250tsd anno 1988 sind pi mal daumen 600tsd heutzutage".

To provide figures in this manner is to report with "false precision", but we could workshop that phrase into something pithier.

Extremzufallsgenauigkeitsangabe?

I really love it when this has clearly happened in US children's books. Things like, "ate nearly 551 pounds of food per day!" or similar.

Schadenfreude

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