Rude units
Stories from Physics
for 11-14
14-16
Austin Sendek, a physics student at the University of California has started a campaign to establish ‘hella’ as the SI prefix for 10 27. In response, B Todd Huffman wrote a letter to Physics World, suggesting ‘tini’ (pronounced with an ‘ee’ sound) for 10 -27, insi (pronounced ‘eensey’) for 10 -30 and winsi (pronounced ‘weensey’) for 10 -33.
He concluded, “I have tried to think of prefixes that would come in on the high end beyond ‘hella’ but unfortunately I could think of nothing that could not be interpreted as a rude word.”
References
‘Quanta, Seen and Heard’, Physics World, April 2010, p. 3
B. Todd Huffman, ‘Feedback’, Physics World, May 2010, p. 14
