Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2022 May 28

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May 28

Placement of units in SI diagram

s on top

and

kg on top

place the SI units at different positions around a circle. Is there a fundamental reason to prefer one above the other (or any other placement)?

Thanks,
cmɢʟee⎆τaʟκ 03:11, 28 May 2022 (UTC)

Symmetry and downflow for second on top. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 03:53, 28 May 2022 (UTC)

P.S. @VIGNERON:

Does the symmetric placement serve any other role than to please the eye? As I understand it, the information conveyed depends solely on the connectivity of a directed graph and not on the placement of its nodes in these visualizations. A rearrangement with fewer crossings between arrows may be easier to understand, but I can see why one would want to keep the physical constants on the outside and the units on the inside (or the other way around, as in the circle diagram). If both illustrations are used together, you may want to use in both not only the same colour scheme, but also the same circular order. The current metric system is known as the mks system, in which "mks" stands for "metre – kilogram – second", which might be an argument – not at all a fundamental reason – for using m – kg – s in that order. For the circle, if the more saturated ring with units is made a bit thinner, the symbols in the desaturated ring with constants (such as K_cd) can be made a bit larger and easier to read. Purely aesthetically, it may then be prettier if the baseline of the multi-letter unit symbols in the circle diagram follows the curvature, like the edge lettering on a coin. Is there a reason to use Δν here, instead of Δν_Cs?  --Lambiam 08:59, 29 May 2022 (UTC)