this post was submitted on 26 May 2026
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[–] hOrni@lemmy.world 196 points 2 weeks ago (8 children)
[–] Thorry@feddit.org 135 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Listen here you little shit

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[–] okwhateverdude@lemmy.world 66 points 2 weeks ago

I'm at a loss for words

[–] funkajunk@lemmy.world 44 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)
[–] danekrae@lemmy.world 17 points 2 weeks ago

Just enough to make the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs.

[–] Ghyste@sh.itjust.works 12 points 2 weeks ago

All of them.

[–] Trex202@lemmy.world 11 points 2 weeks ago

11? Including reverse

[–] ramble81@lemmy.zip 10 points 2 weeks ago
[–] FauxLiving@lemmy.world 9 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I'm at a loss

e:f;b

[–] WhiskyTangoFoxtrot@lemmy.world 8 points 2 weeks ago

Is this Garfield Breast Reduction?

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[–] napkin2020@sh.itjust.works 123 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (5 children)

1 = 壹 2 = 貳 3 = 參 4 = 肆 5 = 伍

These exist as well.

They're used in places where numbers should NOT be forged(i.e. bank documents...)

This is how they got their numeric meanings btw.

[–] danekrae@lemmy.world 58 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

So 伍 is not 5, but five.

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 23 points 2 weeks ago

Their math homework must take forever

[–] lugal@sopuli.xyz 15 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

I don't get 4. At least the kanji 4 looks very different

[–] NikkiDimes@lemmy.world 15 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeaaaah, I don't know Chinese, but I've never seen a kanji of four horizontal lines, just 四 for 4

[–] JollyBrancher@sh.itjust.works 9 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I never learned it as four lines. 四 was the way to do it. Maybe locally or something the hip kids are doing? Source: Mandarin professor ETA: I was a person of simplified Chinese though

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[–] ViperActual@sh.itjust.works 11 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)

Does 0 have a shorthand character as well?

[–] thecatprincx@pawb.social 20 points 2 weeks ago

Can be written as 〇

I'm not sure about China but in Japan there's 〇 which can be used like so: ハ〇〇円 to mean 800 yen, in a restaurant menu for example

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[–] blx@piefed.zip 69 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Sure, when you mean "zero" it may look a bit excessive. But it's quite adequate if you want to express "Void, the Dark Realm of Nothingness and End of All Things".

ps: Glory to ZA̡͊͠͝LGΌ.

[–] ALoafOfBread@lemmy.ml 62 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (5 children)

Yeah líng 零 is pretty annoying as a learner of the language.

The top character is yŭ 雨 which means rain. Confusingly, this is the semantic component - the part that contains the meaning of the character. Explained below.

The bottom character líng 令 means order/command as a noun and verb. This doesn't add meaning, it is the phonetic component: basically a pronunciation cue.

It originally meant "light rain"/"falling in drops, like rain", actually. It began being used to mean "fragments" or "leftover part", then as "remainder" in the mathematical sense. Then, eventually, to mean 0. Another form of líng is 霝 which means raindrops. It has 3 kŏu 口 ("mouth") characters on the bottom to visually represent drops.

So, like a lot of Chinese characters, it really only makes sense when you understand the etymology - and even then it's kind of a stretch

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[–] kshade@lemmy.world 57 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (5 children)

The concept of zero is scary, so it's a wizard shooting lightning from all orifices. Makes sense.

[–] WhatThaFudge@lemmy.world 15 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Under the arms and from the butt are the orifices?

[–] Grass@sh.itjust.works 14 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)
[–] MonkeMischief@lemmy.today 11 points 2 weeks ago

This got weird SO fast.

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[–] andros_rex@lemmy.world 23 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)

No one has mentioned special 2, 两! It’s only for counting certain things.

[–] Scrollone@feddit.it 10 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I mean... in English we also use different words, such as "pair" and "dozen", for some specific numbers.

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[–] Don_alForno@feddit.org 7 points 2 weeks ago

Two guys carrying a table?

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[–] Zannsolo@lemmy.world 15 points 2 weeks ago

You don't divide by 0 in Chinese because he'll jump off the page and kick your ass.

[–] Mwa@thelemmy.club 15 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

well atleast this post + Comments taught me some Chinese.

[–] Jyek@sh.itjust.works 20 points 2 weeks ago (10 children)

And now an English lesson:

The past tense of teach is taught. Teached is not a word.

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[–] Phantaloons@piefed.zip 13 points 2 weeks ago

"Three, Two, One... NOTHING"

scratches head in Mandarin

[–] farmgineer@nord.pub 13 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

Japanese enters the chat:

Left: numeral; middle: regular writing; final: certain formal and non-forgery usecases.

または in point 7 means either variant is OK

The last line says one can use the modern yen sign as well (though some would argue that it's bad manners in at least some situations, but I have no dog in that fight).

万 = 10k. Several countries use both 1k and 10k units (Japan traditionally was on the 10k side but had a lot of influence so now we see both a lot. A used car price might be 130万円 or something ( = 1,300,000 yen)

数字	通常の漢字	金額で使う旧字体(大字)  
0	零	零  
1	一	壱  
2	二	弐  
3	三	参  
4	四	肆  
5	五	伍  
6	六	陸  
7	七	柒(または 漆)  
8	八	捌  
9	九	玖  
10	十	拾  
100	百	佰  
1k	千	仟  
万	万	萬  
円	円	圓(もしくは「円」のまま)  

Chart from here that looks better: https://saiseich.com/business/kanji_kingaku/

We have a way of writing numbers in certain situations. Think of it like checks in the US where we write things in a certain way so that the numbers can't be easily changed to increase the value or something.

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[–] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 13 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (18 children)

Japanese isn’t much better:

一、二、三… 四。

[–] f314@lemmy.world 22 points 2 weeks ago

It’s the same as in Chinese, so I wouldn’t expect it to be 😅

[–] ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net 8 points 2 weeks ago (6 children)

In Spanish it's 1,2,3 and 0.

[–] MadBigote@lemmy.world 7 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

The fourth character he wrote means 4, not 0, though.

[–] ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net 8 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)
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[–] karashta@piefed.social 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I see a little person jumping up and spinning in midair to make an egg shape like a zero

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[–] FosterMolasses@leminal.space 9 points 2 weeks ago

Lmao, I just picked up learning Kanji again after like 3 years (never had time in grad school)

It is rough. But fierce repetition helps a lot. I can see the characters for "read a book" whenever I close my eyelids now hahaha

Once something turns into muscle memory you don't forget.

[–] renzhexiangjiao@piefed.blahaj.zone 7 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

零 isn't too bad as far as chinese characters are concerned. you should see the character for depression. or the biang biang noodles character, although that one is kind of a meme

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