TBF you're skipping intermediate units. After all 12^3 would be 1728 so non-decimal units quick get to weird ratios.
Of course you're also right that imperial and customary measurements use seemingly random ratios even within the same unit of measure: the mile is 5280 feet because a statute mile is 8 furlong, a furlong is 10 chains, a chain is 22 yards (though technically there's the intermediate "rod" unit which is 1/4th of a chain, and thus 5 ½ yards) and a yard is 3ft.
To be fair, I should have said 1760 yards, which is equally weird (its prime factorization is 2 * 2 * 2 * 2 * 2 * 5 * 11, especially the 11 in there is weird, plus the 5 in there makes it more lean towards base 10 than base 12)
If humans had evolved to have twelve fingers and twelve toes, then this could’ve perhaps happened. Even if humanity had chosen base 12 for whatever reason, I’d imagine we’d have different single digit symbols for numbers “A” and “B” that we use in hexadecimal now, with something like “10” representing what we call as 12 in decimal today.
Obviously it didn't and history won't change :)
And yep, no matter in what numeric base you are, "10" will represent the amount of symbols of that base. "10" in binary is 2 in decimal, "10" in hex is 16 in decimal, etc...
There are 22 yards to a chain, 10 chains to a furlong and 8 furlongs to the mile. The intermediate units have fallen out of use, but it's not like the mile is a completely wacky number.
> gallon vs ounce is a ratio of 160?
I see you've never cooked anything. Ever.
Have you read what you wrote? And you forgot the 4 rods to a chain (and thus 5 ½ yards to a rod).
That's 4 different ratios (none of which is 12) to go from kilometer-scale to meter-scale.
> I see you've never cooked anything. Ever.
I fail to see how finding "there are 3 tsp to a tbsp, 2 tbsp to an fl oz, 8 fl oz to a cup, 2 cups to a pint, 2 pints to a quart and 4 quarts to a gallon" odd translate to "you have never cooked anything" compared to "this is a millilitre, it works fine under the entire range, for graduation simplicity there are 10mL to a cL, 10cL to a dL and 10 dL to a L, a liter is a convenience designation for 1dm³".
But anyway, to me it doesn't actually matter.
Admittedly I don't do workshop stuff that much, but when I do, I measure with a ruler, and never needed fractions for that, numbers like 3.333 work fine.
Where do you need fractions if you've got floating point notation, plus if you'd like to use fractions nothing stops you from saying "1 third of a meter".
And the imperial system doesn't really use base 12 much anyway? The only ratio of 12 I see in there is inch and foot. All the rest is various random different ratios (e.g. a mile is 5280 foot? really? and gallon vs ounce is a ratio of 160?), and Fahrenheit is its own separate mess.