L'echelle de l'esprit

How can we explain this feeling, shared by many of us, young and old, of not truly understanding what numbers represent? Why do we have so much difficulty visualizing what thousands or billions correspond to?

In L'Échelle de l'esprit (The Scale of the Mind), Bunpei Yorifuji offers a personal and enlightening reflection on our relationship with numbers.

By questioning our way of thinking about the world in terms of statistics and the omnipresence of numbers in our daily lives, he notes a discrepancy between our ability to "quantify" the world and to "feel" the world.

By identifying the imperfections of the most commonly used units of measurement, the author proposes, in this work, to create new units, more suitable for understanding certain everyday phenomena that, unfortunately, we often have difficulty quantifying. Thus, the author proposes using "Minami" to measure the shared feeling between two people who are more than friends, but not yet lovers; "Thankyou" to quantify the feeling of being able to count on a friend in times of difficulty; and "Bateau-usine" as a way to quantify the feeling of being overworked.

Through this reflection on numbers, Bunpei Yorifuji encourages each person to reclaim their way of perceiving the world and adapt measurement tools to their needs.

Dimensions: 14 × 16 cm

184 pages