A Simple Question

I'm having a hard time with this. How do you tell if a list is in ascending order or descending order?

I know that ascend means to go up and descend means to go down, but I don't know what's what in a list.

Here are examples to help you guys answer me. Which one is ascending and which one is descending?

1. 11/11/2012: Veterans Day
2. 11/12/2012: Stayed home because of Veterans Day
3. 11/13/2012: Went and studied at GED place; took school friends from last year to lunch
4. 11/14/2012: Went and studied at GED place
5. 11/15/2012: Went and studied at GED place; took school friends from last year to lunch
6. 11/16/2012: Stayed home because GED place not open on Fridays
7. 11/17/2012: Stayed home alone all day and enjoyed himself

1. 11/17/2012: Stayed home alone all day and enjoyed himself
2. 11/16/2012: Stayed home because GED place not open on Fridays
3. 11/15/2012: Went and studied at GED place; took school friends from last year to lunch
4. 11/14/2012: Went and studied at GED place
5. 11/13/2012: Went and studied at GED place; took school friends from last year to lunch
6. 11/12/2012: Stayed home because of Veterans Day
7. 11/11/2012: Veterans Day

 

pretty sure the first one is descending and the second one is ascending

 

They don't have objective values. The ascend/descend dichotomy doesn't apply.

 

He means by dates.

Ascending and descending in regards to chronological order.

 

I know that. I'm just saying that since one is not technically greater than another you shouldn't try to force it. Just label it differently.

 

Force what?

 

Did a search and figured it out:

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_difference_between_ascending_and_descending_order

 

The numbers aren't ascending in value. Nor are they descending in value. There is no value to a date. So it isn't ascending or descending.

What you're basically saying is that since the numbers in the date are counting up in one and counting down in the other that's ascending and descending and I'm saying that ascending/descending it determined by whether there is a value change of + or - with each step. There can be an argument made that I'm narrowing the definition further than is necessary but the whole point of this was to disagree with the original post on a fundamental level so I'm not gonna go over that.

 

Like What? . . . lol, I like to argue with people as well ^_^

 

There is value to a date though. That's why we say "August 16th" instead of giving the dates names. For example, the sixteenth day of the month could be renamed to "apple", so instead of "August 16th" we could say "August apple" and the concept would be the same, but there would be no number and hence, no value.

 

You can't add two dates together.

 

The Doctor could . . .

 

No, but you can subtract them.

November 16 - November 1 = 15 days between them.