The metric system sucks
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From: Andrew Usher on 4 Feb 2010 14:04 On Feb 4, 12:05 pm, Bart Goddard <goddar...(a)netscape.net> wrote: > > If you mean non-technical people, they get through most of their > > lives without doing any calculations at all. Engineers, on the > > other hand, have to deal with the density of water quite a bit. Things > > get submerged in it, containers are built empty and later filled > > with it, it can end up standing on the roofs of buildings if you > > didn't design them right, etc. > > "Deal with" is not "calculate." Nobody calculates the > density of water. Pardon me, but what do you mean here? How would you get the density of water in pounds per cubic foot? Andrew Usher
From: Andrew Usher on 4 Feb 2010 14:09 On Feb 4, 11:18 am, nos...(a)nospam.com (Paul Ciszek) wrote: > >> What is the density of water in pounds per cubic foot? > > >As usual, the decimaphile offers us a calculation that > >1. is already known and 2. nobody ever does. Against > > If you mean non-technical people, they get through most of their > lives without doing any calculations at all. Engineers, on the > other hand, have to deal with the density of water quite a bit. I can't believe he couldn't tell you. The density of water (I know in my head) is about 62.4 pounds per cubic foot; 62.3 if correcting for the bouyancy of air (a detail the metric-philes always omit!). Of course it changes with temperature as well; it's rather fortunate that water has a much lower thermal expansion than any other liquid at normal temperatures. Andrew Usher
From: Gerry Myerson on 4 Feb 2010 17:09 In article <hkeig101lnd(a)news3.newsguy.com>, jmfbahciv <jmfbahciv(a)aol> wrote: > I grew up in the US and cannot think in metric terms so I > always have to do a conversion to make guesstimates. > For some strange reason, kilometers seem to take "longer" > to drive than miles when I drove from Buffalo to Port > Huron, Michigan. :-) Probably because of those metric Canadian hours, what with each one being 100 minutes long. -- Gerry Myerson (gerry(a)maths.mq.edi.ai) (i -> u for email)
From: Bob Myers on 4 Feb 2010 17:10 Bart Goddard wrote: > "Bob Myers" <nospamplease(a)address.invalid> wrote in news:hkf3e6$drh$1 > @usenet01.boi.hp.com: > >> Given the above, there would have to be a significant >> justification for continuing with the "English" system, > > I need justification for continuing what I've always > been doing? I don't think so. You personally, of course not. But if I'm in charge of outfitting a new production line, maintenance department, etc., I'm pretty strongly motivated to eliminate inefficiencies. Having to carry duplicate tools, etc., in both metric and English is most definitely one of those inefficiencies, and having to convert back and forth makes for further time wasting and potential errors. So I need to pick one, and frankly, the "English" system winds up being at a disadvantage there - and yes, I would have to have some justification for continuing to use it. > (The point being, as it has always been, the arguments > put forth in burden the world with the metric system > would never be tolerated if applied to any other > aspect of our lives. Except that picking a system of measurements really doesn't have much to do with "any other aspect of our lives," and trying to compare such arguments across these boundaries is pretty much guaranteed to wind up an apples-and-watermelons sort of situation. Bob M.
From: Mark Borgerson on 4 Feb 2010 17:16
In article <a89073d0-cecf-465e-8ec5- 23bf35829e0f(a)m31g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>, k_over_hbarc(a)yahoo.com says... > On Feb 4, 11:18 am, nos...(a)nospam.com (Paul Ciszek) wrote: > > > >> What is the density of water in pounds per cubic foot? > > > > >As usual, the decimaphile offers us a calculation that > > >1. is already known and 2. nobody ever does. Against > > > > If you mean non-technical people, they get through most of their > > lives without doing any calculations at all. Engineers, on the > > other hand, have to deal with the density of water quite a bit. > > I can't believe he couldn't tell you. The density of water (I know in > my head) is about 62.4 pounds per cubic foot; 62.3 if correcting for > the bouyancy of air (a detail the metric-philes always omit!). If you're really talking about density, (mass per unit volume) the buoyancy of air has nothing to do with the result. If you're talking about the WEIGHT of a unit volume, then, in some cases, you may need to correct for the buoyancy of air---which is, of course, a function of altitude. > Of > course it changes with temperature as well; it's rather fortunate that > water has a much lower thermal expansion than any other liquid at > normal temperatures. (unless, of course, you go below 32F! ;-) > > Andrew Usher > |