i love the metric system

I remember discussing why the U.S. still hasn't switched to the metric system in science class one day, our professor figured it came down to cost, if we switched to the metric system then every highway sign, street sign, everything really, would have to be replaced.

Was this at University of Washington?

How did I miss him?!

>> ^00Scud00:

I remember discussing why the U.S. still hasn't switched to the metric system in science class one day, our professor figured it came down to cost, if we switched to the metric system then every highway sign, street sign, everything really, would have to be replaced.


I think it's more the insane reason why you haven't yet got rid of pennies, or still use paper money down to dollar denominations.

It's because there's this weird thing in America where the government is apparently not allowed to just mandate something that's for the common good and go through with it.

Government: "You know, pennies are utterly ridiculous, nothing costs a penny, they fill up your wallet, they are just stupid"
Some fool: "But I like mah pennies, they make me feel warm and fuzzy, you can't take them away, that's against my rights"
Government: "Right you are then... pennies stay"

It's the same for metric. Some people get uppity that they are being told what to do (even though they were obviously initially told to use imperial), and so invoke some stupid 'it's our right to not be forced' shit.

The rest of the world got along just fine switching over to metric. And we're better for it.

Every country has it's stupid ways of doing things, this is one the of US's ones.

>> ^00Scud00:

I remember discussing why the U.S. still hasn't switched to the metric system in science class one day, our professor figured it came down to cost, if we switched to the metric system then every highway sign, street sign, everything really, would have to be replaced.


True. But why not do it gradually - like have a dual system for a few years while you slowly replace signs, etc?

Get with the program America.

Don't forget my personal favorite, pennies actually cost more to make than they're actually worth, yup, pennies are stupid.
>> ^spoco2:

Government: "You know, pennies are utterly ridiculous, nothing costs a penny, they fill up your wallet, they are just stupid"
Some fool: "But I like mah pennies, they make me feel warm and fuzzy, you can't take them away, that's against my rights"
Government: "Right you are then... pennies stay"

I guess we will have to wait for roadsigns to all become electronic in some fashion.. then, we can switch to metric.

invest in LED and solar technology to power our new sign overlords and make this happen. We already have adjustable speed limit signs new on some major freeways here in WA. Maybe its the only way besides a stimulus to recalculate and repaint... interesting>> ^NaMeCaF:

>> ^00Scud00:
I remember discussing why the U.S. still hasn't switched to the metric system in science class one day, our professor figured it came down to cost, if we switched to the metric system then every highway sign, street sign, everything really, would have to be replaced.

True. But why not do it gradually - like have a dual system for a few years while you slowly replace signs, etc?
Get with the program America.

I blame the Stone Cutters for that.

I like our system for small measurements. I prefer fractional divisions, especially with the multiple of two in the denominator. It's easier to think about bisecting graduations than it is to divide them by ten when you are talking about small distances. I mean, a tenth of a mm is just stupid. I'd rather a system that has a finer resolution to its units, i.e. half, quarter, eighth, sixteenth, etc... It gives me a bit more freedom to pick the best unit given the precision of what I'm working with.

I'd never use it in a scientific context however. I'm mostly talking about workshop stuff.

They actually tried to go metric in the 70s. We started learning it in elementary school and there were TV spots trying to teach us all about it--schoolhouse rock kind of stuff. And you started seeing dual units on packaging and speedometers, etc. Coke went from 2-quart to 2-liter bottles, which were a bit larger and therefore popular. Those 2 liter bottles are still around as the only remaining effect of the effort--even NdGT has given up! Americans hate the metric system, but they will put up with it if it means a slightly larger volume of sugary liquid to suck on.

i remember those days>> ^wormwood:

They actually tried to go metric in the 70s. We started learning it in elementary school and there were TV spots trying to teach us all about it--schoolhouse rock kind of stuff. And you started seeing dual units on packaging and speedometers, etc. Coke went from 2-quart to 2-liter bottles, which were a bit larger and therefore popular. Those 2 liter bottles are still around as the only remaining effect of the effort--even NdGT has given up! Americans hate the metric system, but they will put up with it if it means a slightly larger volume of sugary liquid to suck on.

Why you should learn to love the metric system.>> ^bmacs27:

I like our system for small measurements. I prefer fractional divisions, especially with the multiple of two in the denominator. It's easier to think about bisecting graduations than it is to divide them by ten when you are talking about small distances. I mean, a tenth of a mm is just stupid. I'd rather a system that has a finer resolution to its units, i.e. half, quarter, eighth, sixteenth, etc... It gives me a bit more freedom to pick the best unit given the precision of what I'm working with.
I'd never use it in a scientific context however. I'm mostly talking about workshop stuff.

>> ^jbaber:

Why you should learn to love the metric system
Right. You just made my point.

>> ^bmacs27:

I like our system for small measurements. I prefer fractional divisions, especially with the multiple of two in the denominator. It's easier to think about bisecting graduations than it is to divide them by ten when you are talking about small distances. I mean, a tenth of a mm is just stupid. I'd rather a system that has a finer resolution to its units, i.e. half, quarter, eighth, sixteenth, etc... It gives me a bit more freedom to pick the best unit given the precision of what I'm working with.
I'd never use it in a scientific context however. I'm mostly talking about workshop stuff.


As primarily a metric user, I'm just the opposite. When faced with adding 5/8 and 17/32, I'd have an easier time using 15.9 and 13.5. For accuracy I always use fractions though. But the best is when I'm working with something designed in metric so I'm adding 16 and 14...

*Canada

Adding video to channels (Canada) - requested by messenger.

I live in Canada, I grew up with the metric system. For anything that's much smaller or bigger than I can practically hold or lift, it's metric for me. I still use imperial measurements for everything that's near to human scale. Human sized height and weight for example, I think of in inches and pounds.



Except temperature--That Fahrenheit stuff makes no sense to me at all!!

>> ^jbaber:

Why you should learn to love the metric system.


After reading that link, I think he raised a few good points such as nautical miles, and chopping wood but I still don't see that much advantage of imperial over metric. By example:

Fahrenheit degrees are a 0-100 scale of normal temperature: 0° is quite cold, 100° is quite hot.

Celcius 0° is water freezing and 100° is water boiling at 1 atmosphere, isn't that more intuitive than quite cold and quite hot? You can even use water to measure temperature.

Traditional units naturally express an estimation's margin of error.
Because there are units for every scale, my choice of units expresses my confidence in an estimate. Telling you my couch is about 10 ft. 6 in. wide expresses more confidence than saying it is about 10 ft. wide. Because metric units differ by such great amounts, there is often no way to do this. I must say my couch is about 3 meters or 300cm wide. The former implies my margin of error is 1 meter, and the latter that it's 1cm. In reality, I must depend on the roundness of 300 to imply that my margin of error is 10cm.

Err, what about saying it's about 3.3 meters? You can be as vague or precise as you want with metric. How is it intuitive if you can't express the measurement with fraction?

The steps between units are often small and intuitive.... ...A few feet is a yard. A few yards is a rod. A few rods is a chain. 10 chains is a furlong. 8 furlongs is a mile.

What? How is that intuitive? How do you trust measures when you can say a few something is a another thing? How many is a few?

To me, most arguments are about "Imperial is good because I'm familiar with the notions.", which can apply to any deprecated local standard and shouldn't be used as proof of being intuitive.

FYI, I grew up in China that uses another local system which nobody else use. I never liked it even though it mostly uses the power of 10 like the metric system. It's just too arbitrary of a scale to be any use other than understanding what old people is trying to say.