why is it called half-position? on electric guitar and bass it`s called 1st position, and all the positions correspond to fret numbers, but with all other strings (w/out frets) 1st fret is called half-position and 2nd fret is 1st pos, and so on. why make things so confusing?

I`m not sure, but I supspect it`s because the frets are a semitone apart and first position on an unfretted string instrument has your first finger a whole tone above the string.

yeah, that is what i learned, but then the third half step up is not called "1 and a half position" or "1.5 position" or something, it`s called "2nd position". so it`s not very logical. on top of it on a fretted instrument it`d be called "3rd position", which just makes it annoying to communicate about positioning between players of fretted and non-fretted instruments.