Where is the first floor?

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Zero is an interesting concept if anyone wants to read about it

I am somewhat torn on this and think they both make sense

If you feel zero is absence of anything you might call the ground floor 1
But if you see zero as something neutral you might call ground floor 0 (or ground)


I can see both in the real world
0 is a nice reference point, central, with 1 positive (up) - 1 negative (down)

Overall I quite like 0 (rather than ground) there is no debate that if someone said 0 floor you would know it was ground
1st floor opens up questions depending on how you think

Is zero nothing like I have zero apples
Or is it Neutral like 0 Celsius
 
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glen8 said:
ask someone next to you to count to ten

Do they start with 1 or 0?

They start 1, therefore when you walk into a building you are on the 1st floor

or....walk into a shop and ask for three mars bars. Does the assistant hand over 3 or 4 mars bars?

1,2,3
0,1,2,3
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Unfortunately you are very wrong. The count starts from zero, it is just convention to not say it. When you say 1 you have already counted one unit from the start position - hence why having a ground floor from which to count is the correct way.

Let me put it to you this way, what if the building had two below ground floors? By your weird convention the first floor underground would be the zero floor and the one under that would be 2 floors below ground yet only be -1!
 
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It's funny how if you are sky diving, you hit the ground, not the first floor.

If you jump off a building, you hit the ground, not the first floor .

If you jump off outside the window from the first floor, you hit the ground.

If you jump off a floor inside the building, you hit the first floor?

WHAT ON EARTH? What kind of logic is that? You are on the first floor just because you step inside a door?

HSBC in Hong Kong has no door as such on the ground floor, the entire ground floor is wide open. Just because you are inside the footprint of the building means you are now on the 1st floor? What if I am 1 foot in it? Am I both on the ground and 1st floor?
 
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Lysander said:
The first rung on the ladder is not on the ground is it.

The ground is on the ground. Ergo the ground floor is on the ground floor.
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That's what I'm saying, the first rung is the first rung in the same way that the first floor is the first level above GL.
 
Someone has beaten me to it here, you can see on this detailed plan exactly what the floors should be known as.

floors.png


Can't argue with that. It's got axes and everything.
 
Raymond Lin said:
I see it as ground floor, 1st floor etc.

Because when I go up a floor, I go up a single floor.

So when I am on the ground floor, after I gone up a single* floor, I arrive at the 1st floor. I do not go up a single floor and magically arrived at the 2nd floor.

* note the use of the word single, meaning one, not two.
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All you've done there is explain floors numbering from 1 and above, by going up 1 floor you add +1.

It doesn't explain why the first single floor of a building should not be called that. In the same way that if you buy a car, after you currently have a car, that doesn't make it the first car, it makes it the second car.

6Rp1gFX.jpg

How many floors are there? 3.... 1st floor, 2nd floor, 3rd floor.
 
Longbow said:
All you've done there is explain floors numbering from 1 and above, by going up 1 floor you add +1.

It doesn't explain why the first single floor of a building should not be called that.



How many floors are there? 3.... 1st floor, 2nd floor, 3rd floor.
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There are 3, ground floor, 1st floor and 2nd floor. :D
 
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