I think I wasted way too much time on this
Does anyone remember that one episode of iCarly where Carly says there's a new number called "derf" that looks like a weird d or something and then the kid just immediately adjusts to the new number
Yeah so I haven't seen the show in like 8000 years but I couldn't get that scene out of my head because I'm pretty sure the derf number system is just base 11 and I think it would be Really Funny if the team who worked on that show actually did the math and figured out how to multiply higher number bases for one joke
I found the episode and found the part where the kid solves the math problem. Here's what we have to work with: Carly says derf is a new number between 5 and 6 and that you now have to count "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, derf, 6, 7." Since she uses it in counting, we can assume that derf is an integer and not just a random number like 5.5 that's between 5 and 6. Because a new symbol is added and none are removed, we know that Carly and whatshisface are actually using base 11. Here's how the number system looks on paper:
For the purposes of this post, I'm going to start using "D" instead of "Derf" since I can't type the real character, and I'm just lazy. So D replaces what we think of as 6 in base 10. 6 replaces 7, 7 replaces 8, and so on and so forth. Carly then introduces a math problem to That Kiddo. She asks what 12*81÷2 would equal with this new number system, and the kid responds with four hundred derfty seven (4D7). I did some calculations to see if the staff was dedicated enough to do the math correctly or not.
Since I have no idea how to multiply numbers in base 11, I had to start by converting everything to base 10. 12 in base 11 is 13 in base 10, 81 becomes 89 in base 10, and 2 is the same in either base. So now we're left with 13*89÷2.
This is already slightly concerning, because the resulting number is 578.5, and whateverhisnamewas's answer used only integers. Also slightly concerning was the fact that I had only ever converted whole numbers to different bases. Still, I tried to convert this number back to base 11.
The first three digits were easy to convert. I did some quick math, and found that 578 is the same as 486 in base 10. The last digit was difficult. 11^-1 goes into 0.5 5 times, so there's a 5 in the tenths place. I subtracted 5*(11^-1) from 0.5, and then found that 11^(-2) goes into the difference 5 times. There's still a remainder, but I already had the information I needed, so I stopped.
According To My Calculations, 578.5 in base 11 is about 486.6. We're almost done.
Since D replaces 6, any digit above 5 will change symbols. 8 becomes 7, 6 becomes D. We're left with a final answer of 47D.D, not 4D7.
I'm sorry that this is such a long post, but if you got to the end, congratulations. You now know that the makers of iCarly were not willing to waste their time finding the actual solution to a problem that no one would care about. Math Tumblr, if you're reading this, did I do this right? Are my calculations off? iCarly Tumblr, do you exist???? If you actually read all of this, thank you so much for watching me waste time.
tl;dr: the producers of iCarly don't understand base 11
