Talk:911 (number)

Untitled

User:Ed g2s removed the folowing paragraph

• the exact number of days between the 9/11 attack and the March 11, 2004 terrorist attack in Madrid, Spain, not including those dates themselves (the Madrid attack took place on the 912th day following September 11, 2001, when the first day counted is September 12th)

categorising it in his edit summary as "numerology" or "useless trivia. I restored it. this info is useful because it shows the terrorists attach importance to the timing of the attacks. If noticing a pattern like this helps prevent an attack, I wuold hardly call it "useless trivia." Numerao 18:06, 4 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I am going to remove it because it IS useless trivia. People can over analysise anything to find patterns, and I don't see how the difference of 912 days is related at all to 11 September--Clawed 10:10, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

I totally agree. This kind of reasoning is mediaeval. If only people would get a better education in statistics in stead of useless stuff like poetry or such (sorry, you poets, but some things have priority). DirkvdM 17:35, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

I've restored it. Even if it is a coincidence, the difference of 912 days from the 9/11 attack is, at the very least, interesting. Insulting poets does not help your arguments, even if read by non-poets. PrimeFan 21:37, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I forgot the smiley. Here it is :) . But it is complete nonsense. It's about as interesting as the fact that there are three cars in front of my house, while there are also four trees in my back yard. DirkvdM 06:57, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

The number of trees in your back yard might be important in a quantum chaos theory sort of way, but the number of days between 9/11 (the most catastrophic attack on American soil) and 3/11 (pretty sure the Spanish thought it was awful) is a fact of obvious historical importance. Anton Mravcek 20:23, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

This is a too unimportant to waste my time on, but it really is complete nonsense. It's numerology. And it doesn't even fit, which is what the amounts of trees were about. You find a relationship that almost completely fits, but is off by one, so you change it to 'excluding the days themselves'. Also you mention 9/11 vs 3/11, I suppose to show the fact that it was in the same month. If it hadn't been, it would have been the same day, say 9/2, in which case - hey, relevant! - it would also have been a difference of 9 months - notice the '9' in both dates? Or you'd find some other relationship. If not with this then with some other event.

I'm tempted to say 'give me two days and I'll find a relationship between them'. Because I'm sure I could. Especially if all I need is such a weak relationship. But I don't feel like spending the time on it. It only takes one person somewhere to find such a relationship and get everyone crazy, but I'd have to do it on my own. And I don't quite fee like wasting my time on this. DirkvdM 06:36, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

Oops, I notice I've mixed up the days and months. I mistook big endian for little endian (I'm Dutch). Ah well, the sort of reasoning still holds. After all we're not talking contents but numbers.

I added a line about this, which Robert Happelberg then changed to Some people believe that the terrorists chose the date of the attack for this reason, while others believe it's just a coincidence, saying that is more npov. However, the first part seems to specific (is that really the relevance that is assumed here?) and the second bit is definitely not what I meant to say. Saying it's a coincidence implicitly states there's some relevance here, which there isn't. Just like 3 cars in front of my house and 4 trees in my back yard is not a coincidence. There's no commection at all. Likewise, the date 11-9 and the 912 days are not a coincidence. There's nothing there. It's irrelevant because it's numerology. So I'canged it back largely to what I wrote first, just with less sharp wording. DirkvdM 18:00, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

you dont know what numerology is. quick, what's you master number? your life path number? destiny number? soul numbers? are any of them > 10? Think befor you call something something that it ain't. Numerao 16:28, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

What are a master number, life path number, destiny number and soul numbers? I didn't think (so to say),

I checked the numerology article, and it seems to apply.

Primefan addressed me on my talk page about this, but that should be here, so I've moved it:

Numerology is taking someone's name and birthdate, using modular arithmetic to boil them down to single digits, then using those single digits to make general statements about their personality and try to predict their future. It's on the same level of esteem as astrology, and to call something "numerology" is offensive.

Noting the interval between major events (such as Abraham Lincoln noticing there 87 years between the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the Battle of Gettysburg) is not numerology. Neither is noting the interval between terrorist attacks, or wondering if the attack on Flight 231 had anything to do with a U.N. resolution of that number. PrimeFan 22:44, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

You provide the link to the article, but have you read it? Numerology is much more than what you say. It's the seeking (or assuming) of mystical relations between numbers. Any numbers. It's also applied to religious stuff like the Bible, to mention but one other thing. I would also say it's an offensive term, but that's pov. Aren't you insulting astrologists now? I'd give you kudos for that ;) , but you can't present that as a reason for wikipedia edits. There are ()obviously and apparently) people who claim this is numerology and it's relevant. My two criteria for placing information. DirkvdM 10:38, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

But I'll ask at the numerology talk page, because that seems a more appropriate place still. There is already a bit about the number 11 in the attack there, but not about this. DirkvdM 08:31, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

Regardless of whether this information belongs on Wikipedia (even if it wasn't a coincidence, and it is, what ever happened to "no original research"?), and regardless of whether this information is numerology (or at least numerological), it certainly doesn't belong here. It has next to nothing to do with the actual number "911"; it's got more to do with 912, and only has any significance in the context of an article about one of the two terrorist attacks. If I was to recommend an article to put it in, I'd probably go with 9/11 conspiracy theories. It certainly fits the tone and general idea. If we keep it here, we'll have to add in ten thousand other random instances of the number cropping up in various obscure and irrelevant ways throughout human history. -Silence 03:19, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

Original research this? Ha! no one here claims to have been teh first to notice this coincidence (and it's at least that). Numerao 22:31, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Then you can very easily site a source, so it looks less like Wikipedia itself is stating that the number of days difference is significant and more like certain people are and we're just reporting it. "X claims" is always much better, especially with such dubious connections. Regardless, that has nothing to do with my central point—the paragraph has as nothing to do with the number "911" itself. Number pages should be reserved for especially significant facts that directly relate to this number and how it is commonly understand in various fields (i.e. if "911" was the code for something in medicine or whatever, not if it was the number of days or months or any other increment of time between two related events) or in general common knowledge. That's why mentioning the September 11th attacks is definitely significant to this page, and why mentioning the 911-days thing isn't—not only is it verging on trivia (which wouldn't be such a problem, except that this is a pretty small page already, so stuff like this sticks out like a sore thumb!), but it's also indisputably a subdivision of the 9/11 mentioning: it is solely significant because of another fact mentioned on the article, and thus could easily (and probably should) be put into another article that deals more directly with the subject itself (the terrorist attacks). Not with the number. -Silence 05:53, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

If they had attacked on March 10, it's possible people might not have noticed that it was the 911th day after. But with March 11, it was inevitable people would think 3/11 and wonder if there was any other connection to 9/11. I don't understand the way terrorists think, but I do understand that they put some thought on what dates they choose to attack on. ShutterBugTrekker 21:58, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

You guys are missing the point. That instance of "911" is not something significant relating directly to the number 911 (which is the topic of this article), but rather something significant relaying to the 9/11 terrorism attacks. They should be mentioned on pages dealing with those attacks, and only on pages dealing with those attacks. If they aren't moved, we'll need to move every other bit of 911-related information on all the 9/11-related pages onto this page too. -Silence 22:45, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

Their were 911 days between the two attacks, thats relevant to 9/11 AND teh number 911 even if its just a coincidence. Their was another attack a day, a month and a year after 9/11, that's about 400 days, its relevant to 9/11 but not to 911. Numerao 17:21, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

No, it's not relevant to the number. It deals with the number, but countless things deal with the number; only things that anyone (or a certain field, like mathematics) would immediately associate with the number "911" if it was mentioned out of any context. This is not the case with the "911 days between 9/11 and the later attack"; if the number 9/11 wasn't already significant for the bombing of the Twin Towers on that date, the 911-day difference between the two attacks would be completely irrelevant.. Accordingly, this is not a general fact about the number "911" and its common uses, but rather a sub-fact dealing exclusively with the broader numeric significance of the September 11th terrorist attacks. It no more belongs on this page than an event that's only significant to the 1337 language would be on a 1337 (number) page (if we had one, which we would if it had any special numerical significance); we would mention the 1337 language on a 1337-number page, but we wouldn't mention any factoids that are solely relevant in reference to or within the context of 1337 (which is why there is no 1337 number page; even though there are odd little interesting coincidences and details relating to numbers for the number 1337, like that old 666+1337 thing a few years ago, those are only important because of that specific relevance of 1337, and thus would not belong on the number page); those would go on the pages dealing with that specific subject. Even though the tidbit about the number of days between attacks indirectly relates to the number 911, it only does so in reference to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and thus does not belong on this page any more than any other details about 9/11 or the events preceding or following it do, and any more than a weird 911 coincidence involving the Porsche 911 would; it would belong on that page. -Silence 17:50, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Two numbers: 1 202. Which fact do you notice first -- There are exactly 200 numbers between the two numbers, or that 202 is the 201st number after 1? Probably the latter, although the 200 numbers in between is a round number and 201st number is not (deliberate attempt). The presence of a specific number of numbers/days/whatnot between two items is not considered near as important as the ordinal number of the second item in relation to first (i.e. we consider 'y is the n-th after x' more important than 'there are n between x and y'). The fact that there are 911 days between 9/11/01 and 3/11/04 is only considered because of the significance of 9/11, but we come across 3/11/04 as being the 912th day after 9/11, not the day-after-the 911th day.

Also, to go back to Numerao's original statement that 'If noticing a pattern like this helps prevent an attack, I wuold hardly call it "useless trivia,"' why didn't people notice a pattern like this? Like Nostradamus (IMHO) -- it's people who wonder that something could have predicted this and find something that (albeit quite weakly -- see comments above) could have done so, immediately parade this as being a predictor. Because 911 days after 3/11/04 will fall somewhere around the start of September this year, should we be predicting a terrorist attack then, or perhaps one should have happened around February 2005 because that's 311 days after 3/11/04? Oh wait, sorry, I mean 912/312 days (respectively). The point is there's no predictive power in this, so it's "useless trivia," and does not belong on this page unless someone can provide proof that the number of days between two attacks is directed by the date of the first attack.

To finish up, I vote that this tidbit be deleted as irrelevant. IMacWin95 15:15, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Maybe now they woudln't choose those particular days, but maybe that's why they chose 3/11. Them terrorists put alot of thought into the days they choose. Numerao 17:37, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

If they had attacked on March 10 instead, we Americans would've probably not have thought of counting the number of days in between. Cromulent Kwyjibo 21:10, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

George Wanker Bush

I removed this from the article:

• a bit-flip in computer data, in which byte 9, bit 1, is set to 1, as in this example C code:

char string[]="George Walker Bush";
string[9] |= 1 << 1;

The result of this C code is to change George Walker Bush's name to "George Wanker Bush." Don't get me wrong, I don't like Bush (anyone too coward to let the Marines at his inaugural parade carry rifles with bolts doesn't deserve to be President), but this 911 bit-flip sounds like a needlessly elaborate joke (when Bush is a much simpler joke) and not an actual operation programmers use on an everyday basis. As such, it is my opinion that it is irrelevant to an article on the integer 911. PrimeFan 20:38, 12 July 2005 (UTC)