Keeping track of positive and negative exponents is sure easier than
keeping track of those latest stupid prefixes the guys in the
smoke-filled room added to the metric system -- yotta/yocto,
zetta/zepto, etc. Have you ever seen any of those used to designate
very large or very small values?
Things were better back when I was just a tad undergraduate. My
department chair (Swerwood Githens) told us that nuclear types had
their own names for very small values of area and time. Neutron cross
sections were measured in BARNS (10*-24 sq cm) and very short
radioactive halflives were measured in JIFFYS (10*-24 sec).
Only astronomers are smart enough not to fall for all this prefix
crap. Parsecs are perfectly good distance units.