24 MP from an entry level DSLR

Ummm...

With all due respect, while my particular graduate degree isn't in mathematics, between undergraduate and graduate I more than fulfill the requirements for a BS in statistics, and you guys are going way, way off track here.

We're measuring area, not a line.

We don't see lines, we see area.

I understand where people are going with dpi and "resolution", but that is with all due respect, mathematically ignorant.

With a 18 megapixel image, we see 18 million pixels, which is 50% more than 12 million pixels. Period.

Now, if one says that it only takes 22% more on width and length to produce 50% more in area, well, OK, duh, we just gronked somewhere around elementary to middle school mathematics.

Doesn't matter, irrelevant.

If we see a single line one pixel wide or high, then we see essentially nothing. What we actually see is length times width, which is area, which takes us all the back to simply comparing megapixels to megapixels. "Resolution" as in comparing DPI to DPI is false sophistication, DPI squared is what we necessarily actually see in an image.

I don't mean this as a critique of Wilbe or Digirame, both of whom I consider to be intelligent posters who I very much respect. But, I do feel that in the process of radically increasing the post frequency in what has often been a sleepy forum growing sleepier, Sovran has introduced a bit of the poison fruit, in terms of what can appear logical on the surface, but is nonsensical one level down. IMHO and YMMV.