The metric system sucks
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From: Andrew Usher on 12 Feb 2010 18:27 On Feb 12, 11:49 am, Osmo R <ok...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > Seriously, do people who write these think think at all? > Traditionally one would have needed exact measures of mass/weight > when one traded things. The buyer is interested in getting enough > of the stuff he buys and the seller is interested in getting > enough the valuable metal used as money. The issues is about > amount or mass. The forces are irrelevant even though the scales > used gravity as means of comparing the masses. Causing and > responding to gravity is one of the two main properties of mass. > Therefore the fact that one uses gravity as means to compare > masses does not mean one is not comparing masses. A pound of > silver is same at the sea level as it is in the mountains. > > I do not think the concept of force was well formulated before > Newton, so the concept of pound being originally force is strange. Add to this the fact that the government defines the pound in terms of the kilogram, not the Newton. This is pretty much a summary of what Nygaard had on his page. Of course, it originally comes from pro-metric propaganda - the English system has no proper unit for mass, horrors! Andrew Usher
From: toby on 12 Feb 2010 18:27 On Feb 3, 5:38 am, "Heidi Graw" <hg...(a)telus.net> wrote: > "Ken S. Tucker" <dynam...(a)vianet.on.ca> wrote in messagenews:2d8ea280-58fb-41da-900d-8c6777b446c6(a)n33g2000yqb.googlegroups.com... > > >Ken wrote: > > I build houses, and very much respect an old 1940's decision > > to base housing construction on 4" x 4" square, leading to > > such things like 4'x8' plywood... > > ...that is 5/8" thick... > > >... and 2"x4" studs, and much more. > > ...like those 2"x10"? > > > That decision resulted in building high quality low cost homes, > > that fit together with a minimum of customized thinking. > > Well...instead of building by the square foot, you could build > by the square metre. > > > The base 12 of the foot is divisible by 2,3,4,6, the number > > 10 cannot be divided by those without screeeching decimals. > > 2.5 doesn't involve all that much screeching...no worse than > trying to finangle something that is 3/16" of whatever. > > > > > My wife finds MEtric to be annoying, when cooking, when table > > spoons, ozs etc work fine. Cups, quarts and gallons works ok. > > I use metric measures and metric recipes. Works just fine. > > > > > In Canada kms are too small cuz miles is what a big country > > needs, 60 mph is a mile a minute. > > Hey, I like driving 120 km/hr down the freeway. In my experience, that would make you the slowest driver on Ontario highways... > It gives me > the impression I'm going much faster than I'm actually driving. ;-) > > > I figure ya gotta be bi-measureable now a days. > > Yes, it comes in handy knowing both, especially when it > involves cross-border trade and tourism with the US. 70F also > sounds a lot warmer than 20C. No wonder the Americans > think Canadians live in igloos. > > > Common units work extremely well, but if you want your house > > built in MeTric I'll add 25% to the cost, and you've got it. > > No need. I wouldn't be hiring you anyway. My husband > built the house I designed. Custom? Very...and rather > quite unique. > > Take care, > Heidi <...whose house is a mishmash of German metric and British standard.
From: Andrew Usher on 12 Feb 2010 18:33 On Feb 12, 8:02 am, jmfbahciv <jmfbahciv(a)aol> wrote: > > My assertion is not a metaphor here. It's entirely literal: Americans > > now feel they must apologise for having a 'backward' system of > > measure. > > I'm an American and I have never felt the need to apologize. Well, that's because you're a woman and so never feel the need to apologise. > Why do you? _I_ don't, obviously! Andrew Usher
From: Bart Goddard on 12 Feb 2010 19:59 toby <toby(a)telegraphics.com.au> wrote in news:7d81725f-aae8-4b92-8836- a63f4dbabd51(a)m4g2000vbn.googlegroups.com: > On Feb 3, 12:04�am, "Heidi Graw" <hg...(a)telus.net> wrote: >> <chuckle> ...and lots of folks do just that. �A good question >> to ask is, �"How do you get the most using the least amount of >> energy?" �If cosmetology earns one an adequate living, and it >> requires less energy and effort, then why not? > > Because you'd rather be doing something else? Indeed, "How do you get the most..." isn't really what most folks would call a "good question." Rather it's a greedy question, and we're not, these last couple years, all that enamored of greed. B. -- Cheerfully resisting change since 1959.
From: Matt on 12 Feb 2010 23:27
On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:02:26 -0800, Michael Press wrote: >In article <joo1n55f1f4is2notocvi6elvku27ar5q9(a)4ax.com>, > Matt <30days(a)net.net> wrote: > >> A (aqueous) chemistry lab is a cherry-picked environment for arguing >> the merits of the metric system. The density of water is quite >> important there. Not so much in a metallurgy lab. The density of iron >> is expressed no more conveniently in metric (7.874 g/cm^3) than >> English units (491.6 lb/ft^3). > >Everyone knows that only SI units >are proper so that should be 7874 kg/m^3'. First, let's talk about those 'proper' SI units. Your preferred system of units seems to be meter-kilogram-seconds. Why is it the metric units are never systematized as 'meter-gram-seconds' (mgs)? Because the 'gram' is too small. It was designed for the convenience of table-top chemists in a wet chemistry lab. The gram is too small for use in most of life. Even the chemists didn't want a mgs system, so they opted for a cgs (centimeter-gram-seconds) system. They used the gram; but the meter was too big for table-top chemistry, so they adopted the centimeter. But the centimeter is too small for use in most of life. If the metric system is so well-conceived, where is the call for using the meter-gram-second system >Convenience has nothing to do with it. Huh?! Isn't that the primary argument for adopting the metric system: because it is so much more convenient to use a decimalized system of units? What is your case for using the metric system if not for convenience? >We must sacrifice our comfort. Excuse me? For whom or what do you assert that we *must* sacrifice our comfort? Would that not be a religious position? What god do you hope to appease with this sacrifice? |