Logarithms are a shortcut for exponents. There are patterns in logarithms that are fairly easy to understand. For example, the logarithm of 100 to base 10 is 2. The logarithm of 1000 to base 10 is 3.

There are two main reasons to use logarithmic scales in charts and graphs. The first is to respond to skewness towards large values; i.e., cases in which one or a few points are much larger than ...

More by Kurt Kleiner This article was originally published with the title “A Natural Log: Our Innate Sense of Numbers is Logarithmic, Not Linear” in SA Mind Vol. 19 No. 4 (August 2008), p. 13 ...