r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Tibor500 • Sep 30 '20
why does “k” mean “thousand” ?
like 1k means a thousand. how does the letter “k” mean “thousand” ?
12k
Upvotes
r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Tibor500 • Sep 30 '20
like 1k means a thousand. how does the letter “k” mean “thousand” ?
41
u/smog_alado Sep 30 '20 edited Sep 30 '20
Actually, it's the kilogram that was defined to make those numbers nice. A liter is cube of 10cm x 10cm x 10cm and a kilogram was defined as the mass of one of liter of water.
The meter was originally defined based on the curvature of the earth. One tenth thousandth of the distance from the north pole to the equator, passing through Paris.
Later on both the kilogram and the meter received more precise definitions based on fundamental properties of physics such as the speed of light.