Metric vs. Imperial!

[skyliner22 16]

I live in the US and the Imperial is pointless. In science classes we always use metric which makes things so much simpler, why does US have to be so stubborn!

[Jasoncw 11,949]

Originally posted by: Voar TokAlso, the meter was (if I remember correctly) supposed to be one millionth of the distance that light traveled in a vacuum.  Either way, the metric system is much more intelligent because people actually sat down and decided what would be the most logical way to measure things, and the metric system became the result.quote>

Why is that distance the most logical?  Why not choose any other standard distance?  And why one millionth?  Why not one thousandth?  Why base ten?  To me the metric system seems like it's based on scientific human constructs, and has no meaning or relevancy to real life.  The imperial units are based off of the human body and activities related to it.

"hmmm, that ledge looks to be the distance which light would travel in a vacuum in about 1/299,792,458^ths of a second tall."

"hmmm, that ledge looks to be about three times the length of my forearm tall."

The metric system makes a lot of sense for scientists, for obvious reasons, but I think for everyday life the imperial system is better.

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: Jasoncw Why is that distance the most logical?  Why not choose any other standard distance?  And why one millionth?  Why not one thousandth?  Why base ten?  To me the metric system seems like it's based on scientific human constructs, and has no meaning or relevancy to real life.  The imperial units are based off of the human body and activities related to it.

"hmmm, that ledge looks to be the distance which light would travel in a vacuum in about 1/299,792,458^ths of a second tall."

"hmmm, that ledge looks to be about three times the length of my forearm tall."

The metric system makes a lot of sense for scientists, for obvious reasons, but I think for everyday life the imperial system is better.quote>

Trouble is, not everyone's forearm is the same length. So you can't really use such a thing as a precise standard. Everyday recognition of the definitions aren't an issue since people don't care about the definitions, just the concepts. So far as most Americans are concerned, a gallon is the amount of milk that comes in one of those one gallon plastic jugs, not 231 cubic inches.

And, similarly, a liter would be half the amount of soda in one of those two liter soda bottles, not 1000 cubic centimeters.

Of course, that seemingly arbitrary fraction of the speed of light used for the meter does have the convenient consequence that one liter of distilled water at 277 K weighs one kilogram.

[belfastuniguy 18]

The UK is somewhat more complicated.

We use a mixture of both and works fine in my view.

Examples;

You ask for a pint of beer not "I'll have 568ml of beer thanks'

Acres for land

Miles are used for road distance, traffic signs and speed measurement

Knots for ship speed

Nautical miles

Feet for aircraft

Loose food sold in metric but Imperial can be displayed alongside

Pretty much all pre-packed food is displayed in metric

We use both, may sound complicated, but works perfectly fine we don't have any problems or confusion. I see no need to change our system.

[Zelgadis 638]

From a literary standpoint, imperial is vastly superior.

Metric might be nice, if it hadn't been for the completely unimaginative names that were selected for it. Imperial measurement names sound much better and roll off the tongue much more nicely. Metric is best for science, but imperial is best for... "saying." "Inch Worm." "Centimeter Worm" Now which one sounds better?

Other than that, the argument is rather silly. Use what you like. I recall reading awhile back a case where the EU, in an effort to stamp out all use of imperial measurements, forbid the use of the imperial system to sell food. And some shopkeepers in Britain rebelled against the law. Good for them! If there was ever a more pointless, useless, ill-conceived, waste of time in the history of the planet, it would be that law. Is it so hard to just let people use the measurements they like? I don't see the problem.

I most certainly hope the US doesn't change.  Then they'd have to change all the road signs (which are in MPH) and exit numbers (which are based on the number of miles they are from the state lines), and a host of other things.  It's bad enough that we waste our taxes on some of the stupid stuff we waste our taxes on.  Why add another pointless money-waster?

ISF

[belfastuniguy 18]

Other than that, the argument is rather silly. Use what you like. I recall reading awhile back a case where the EU, in an effort to stamp out all use of imperial measurements, forbid the use of the imperial system to sell food. And some shopkeepers in Britain rebelled against the law. Good for them! If there was ever a more pointless, useless, ill-conceived, waste of time in the history of the planet, it would be that law. Is it so hard to just let people use the measurements they like? I don't see the problem. quote>

Indeed they did

There was somewhat for a national annoyance by what was described as EU interference. The EU has dropped it demands for the UK to change to complete metrication. Miles and Pints will not change as the EU does not want to interfere in historic cultural traditions and all food sold in metric is allowed to have imperial alongside it. Which is very common, means both parties get their way.

Also remember the EU have been demanding UK metrication since 1978...and its not going to happening anymore,

[Zelgadis 638]

Yup, that's what I read all right.

It truly, honestly, and completely mystifies me why so many people have a bug up their butts about the imperial system.

I just... don't... get it.

I had a European friend question me about the writing of dates in America:  Month/Day/Year.  So today is 04/16/08.  My friend said it was stupid because it was not logical.  Year (biggest) month (middle) day (smallest)  or day/month/year is much more logical, he said. 

I asked him, "What gives you the idea that it needs to be "logical?"  Is it really so hard to remember?  Imperial isn't difficult either.  12 inches to a foot.  3 feet to a yard.  1760 yards, or 5280 feet to a mile.  Which is just peachy for everyday use for me. 

ISF

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

Dividing everything by tenths is indeed better, but I totally agree with zelgadis (although it should really be 2.54 centimeter worm)

I love the sound of MPH, of "Oh man, it's a hundred freakin' degrees today!" But I really can't find fault for anyone wanting to use metric. It kinda reminds me of the Mac vs PC argument. Use what you want!

[vilbe 6]

"metric, teach it to your mother"....

my favorite imperial unit is the hogshead

[david1314 44]

The imperial system was designed by people using real world measurements. For example, when I walk into the bar, a SINGLE drink should be ONE pint, not x-hundred ml.

A cup is a sensible measurement for baking and cooking...and works for both fluids and solids.

A mile make more sense for long distances than does a meter (and hiding three of its 0's behind the prefix "kilo-").

The inch and foot make a much more sensible discussion terms...the separation between the cm and meter leaves a lot of common distance to question (still a question of mystery zeros).

And its just plain more fun. All you stupid Euros have no idea how to work my system. I know your inside and out. I really like converting the European measurements to imperial before giving them back to Europeans...haha they have no idea what's going on.

Oh, also, the ounce is a bit more sensible than either a cl or liter...and anyone who's ever bought drugs, knows full well the imperial system is way better. Ha, you silly 1 and 5 g buying individuals.

The temperature range is more useful in imperial for describing environmental conditions (roughly a 100 degree span--0 deg to 100 deg--for the Anglo world). All the metric system describes on the same interval is water. The entire continent has a roughly 30 deg spread (annually) from which you are to interpolate the actual atmospheric conditions. In the US, the fahrenheit system gives you a 30 deg span for a single DAY. Much more information is conveyed about the exact atmospheric temperature.

It really comes down to whether you think it's more useful to have a unit of measurement consistent with unit being handled, or if you want a unit of measurement that is conjured regarding the properties of water.

Imperial is way better.

My favorite imperial unit: the yard, 80 oz. of beer.

That's 4 beers for you Euros (well 12 for you Frechies)

Edit: Zelgadis and I seem to be in about the same boat.  And Zelgadis, if anyone ever asks you the question about the date, kindly remind them that you're American and people will work around what you tell them too...damn their logic

[hamsterTK 93]

I don't care either way  but being american and so attuned to imperial I "think in it"

as in, 110 kph sounds really too fast to be driving, and a person 1.5 meters tall sounds like a midget, and 30 degrees sounds kind of cold, while all at the same time I am perfectly aware of course that those mean something different...

Also while I can understand how the metric system works I sometimes have trouble "visualizing" a measurement. For example I sort of have in my head how big a mile or 10 feet is. However with metric that isn't there and I always have to think back to what they convert to in imperial before I can visualize or feel it.

[Aontan 0]

Let's just boil it down to this; which sounds better -

"A Royale with cheese."

or

"A Quarter Pounder with cheese."

Sorry, couldn't resist the movie reference...

[Zelgadis 638]

Okay, how about this?

"I drove to the mall yesterday and I got stuck behind some old guy inching along so slowly it made me nuts!"

"I drove to the mall yesterday and I got stuck behind some old guy centimetering along so slowly it made me nuts!"

Now... Which sounds better?

ISF

[krbe 193]

Well, if you were in Germany, you wouldn't have had that problem, as you could just take the left lane and stop think about both your own speed, wether mph or km/h, or that other guy's (wether mph or km/h).

What sounds better? 50 mph on the highway, or unlimited on the Autobahn? Unless you hit one of the holiday Staus of course, which can run into.. 100's of kilometres!

[vilbe 6]

Originally posted by: david1314Oh, also, the ounce is a bit more sensible than either a cl or liter...and anyone who's ever bought drugs, knows full well the imperial system is way better. Ha, you silly 1 and 5 g buying individuals.quote>

you could argue, that its taught american's how to convert to metric sense the 70's. why else would knowing 28.8 grams to an ounce be useful?

[Boggy1 45]

I use a mixture of both, as do most people in the UK. It's far easier.

Length

Small Distances: Centimeters, Millimeters

Larger Distances: Inches

Medium Distances: Feet/Meters

Large Distances: Miles

Height

For objects: Centimeters/Inches/Meters

For biological things: Feet/Inches (e.g. I am 6 feet 2 inches)

Weight

For ingredients et all: Milligrams/Grams/Kilograms

For liquids: Liters

For biological large weights: Stone

For biological small weights: Pounds

And of course the date system: DD/MM/YYYY

And time is generally the 24hour clock. We learned the 12hour clock in Primary school...but I honestly haven't used it in years in normal conversation.

[krbe 193]

Well, time is actually based upon the Babylonian 60-system (60 sec in a min, 60 min in an hour), and the calendar is as far as I remember Roman/Catholic. The French tried a 10-day week and 10-hour day after the revolution, but it didn't work out that well.

But for those of you happy with the customary / Imperial system, how would you feel introducing a non-decimal system for your money (again)? Though measure and weight are in large parts a customary thing, going from a decimal system to one with not-so-obvious conversions are much harder.

[threeswept 12]

Metrics rules and is completely logical...Imperial sucks! Living in the US and like the UK, we have a combination of both which makes it confusing for a lot of people - for exactly some of the same reasons mentioned above - soda in litres, fuel in gallons, drinks in pints, perfume in ounces, soap in grams...it's just stupid. Marin County, north of San Francisco, has km's posted (on a small sign) below the mph signs on some major roads. It's kind cool and is great because my car is only in km's, no mph. Although, I have to say that it's much more relative and impactful to say 95 degrees (Fahrenheit) rather than 35 degrees (Celsius).

[Haljackey 17,398]

Well, just check these maps out:

Grey:  Metric

Red: Imperial

Countries by date of metrication:

World Map showing Metrication, colour-coded by year of conversion. Using data from USMA (U.S. Metric Association) here.

(Note regarding the United Kingdom and the United States: Data indicates UK was metric in the 1960s - they made a decision to go metric in the 1960s and made a legal commitment to do so in 1973 as part of its conditions for membership in the EEC (now the EU), but then did little about the decision. The UK now uses metric however, and it is illegal to sell products weighed only in imperial measurements; imperial measurements have not been taught in schools since the 1970s either. This is similar to the situation occurring in the US, where metric is the 'official' system for lengths and weights, though its metrication process has been very slow due to public pressure and lack of funding.)

Interesting eh?

Best,

-Haljackey

[Duke87 1,070]

Obviously, the powers of 10 thing is what SI really has going for it.

Which would you rather use and have to remember?

This:

Volume:

3 teaspoons in a tablespoon

2 tablespoons in a fluid ounce

8 fluid ounces in a cup

2 cups in a pint

2 pints in a quart

4 quarts in a gallon

32 gallons in a barrel (approximately, depends on what it's a barrel of. A barrel of crude oil is 55 gallons)

2 barrels in a hogshead

Weight/force:

16 ounces in a pound

2000 pounds in a ton

2240 pounds in a long ton

14 pounds in a stone

Length:

12 inches in a foot

3 feet in a yard

1760 yards (or 5280 feet) in a mile

16.5 feet in a rod, 320 rods in a mile

660 feet in a furlong, 8 furlongs in a mile

Area:

144 square inches in a square foot

43560 square feet in an acre

640 acres in a square mile

Mass:

slugs only

Energy:

about 4 calories in a BTU. Or you can murder units and use "kilowatt hours".

Power:

horsepower only. Oh, and one is 550 lb-ft/s, not 1

Pressure:

pounds per square inch

Temperature:

Fahrenheit, with water freezing at 32 and boiling at 212, or Rankines

Electric charge:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Electric current:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Electric resistance:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Capacitance:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Magnetic Flux:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Magnetic intensity:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Inductance:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Luminous flux:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Luminous intensity:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Illuminance:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Frequency:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Radioactivity:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

Absorbed radiation:

no such quantity. You're SOL.

or this:

Volume: liter

Weight/Force: Newton

Length: meter

Area: square meter

Mass: kilogram

Energy: Joule

Power: Watt

Pressure: Pascal

Temperature: Centigrade, with water freezing at 0 and boiling at 100, or Kelvins

Electric charge: Coulomb

Electric current: Ampere

Electric resistance: Ohm

Capacitance: Farad

Magnetic flux: Weber

Magnetic intensity: Tesla

Inductance: Henry

Luminous flux: lumen

Luminous intensity: candela

Illuminance: lux

Frequency: Hertz

Radioactivity: becquerel

Absorbed radiation: Gray

yocto- 10^-24

zepto- 10^-21

atto- 10^-18

femto- 10^-15

pico- 10^-12

nano- 10^-9

micro- 10^-6

mili- 10^-3

centi- 10^-2

deci-  10^-1

deka- 10¹

hecto- 10²

kilo- 10³

mega- 10⁶

giga- 10⁹

tera- 10¹²

peta- 10¹⁵

exa- 10¹⁸

zetta- 10²¹

yotta- 10²⁴

US customary units are rather draconian in that there's little coherence in how they relate to each other and how they're named. SI is much more neat and organized.

Also, if you can think of any standard SI units I missed, feel free to chime in and I'll add them here.

[GingerBlokey 30]

Personally I hate having two systems.

I use miles for physical distances like walking or train journeys.

I use feet / inches for height and sometimes feet for short distances.

I use litres for liquids.

I use centimetres for drawing diagrams (mm too).

I use inches for lengths of things.

I use acres for area.

I use centigrade for temperature.

I use stone for weighing humans, kg for weight ingredients.

Same as most people in the Uk who live on a weird knife edge between metric and imperial.

[krbe 193]

Originally posted by: Duke87

US customary units are rather draconian in that there's little coherence in how they relate to each other and how they're named. SI is much more neat and organized.

Also, if you can think of any standard SI units I missed, feel free to chime in and I'll add them here.quote>

And that Imperial and customary units often differ, such as when you're reading tables: Gallons (Imp), Gallons (US), and so on.

[Nerd_Guy 4]

99% of the time, all of my measuring is in the US Customary System.

The other 1% is in my Physical Science class.

[belfastuniguy 18]

That map is actually kind of incorrect haljackey

The UK is not exclusively Metric. I know the note below explains things, but there is no longer a legal need for the UK to switch completely to Metric given public opposition. Both systems are allowed to exist until a time that changes or the public stop using one or the other.

[Haljackey 17,398]

Originally posted by: belfastuniguy That map is actually kind of incorrect haljackey

The UK is not exclusively Metric. I know the note below explains things, but there is no longer a legal need for the UK to switch completely to Metric given public opposition. Both systems are allowed to exist until a time that changes or the public stop using one or the other.quote>

Well, its really not my doing.  I got the maps and that note from Wikipedia.  Go ahead and edit it if you want to!  (As long as you site proper references, or else you'll get that dreaded "Citation needed".  EEK!)

Here is the link to the article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication

Best,

-Haljackey

[Patricius Maximus 236]

Metric is superior to Imperial. For the following reasons:

1. The conversions are easy. All you have to do is shift a decimal or use a simple formula that you can do in your head.

2. The Imperial system is hard to remember (ex.  5280 ft = 1 mi, 3 ft = 1 yd, 1760 yd = 1 mi). Where's the logic in this? Powers of 10 are much more logical.

3. Contrary to the popular opinion, I am one of the few here that can picture a kilometer or liter. Grams are easier to use for drug measurements than ounces. Example: 5 mg of Prednisone or 1/4 ounces. Example: 800 mg of Tylenol or 40 ounces.

4. Degrees Celsius is more logical than Fahrenheit. 100 Celsius or 212 Fahrenheit. 0 Celsius or 32 Fahrenheit.

5. People thinking that the meter and so on is artificial. All units except the kilogram have been standardized with natural forces. Example: The Second. 9 trillion or so (I can't remember) oscillations of the Caesium-133 atom. The Meter: the distance that light travels in about 1/300000000 of a second.

In short, the Metric system is utterly superior and that's why I'm a proud user of it .

- Patricius Maximus

[coolotter88 2]

I would definitely support SI for important things like drug measuring (not illegal ones mind you), and scienc-ey precise measurements but on a day to day basis, US customary is fine and I see no reason for change from miles to km, or gallons to liters of gasoline at the pump, or pounds to kilograms of food at the store because right now, miles, gallons and pounds are perfectly fine and there is absolutely NO REASON to switch. It's not like the scientists are using US customary either (they better not be or I'll got over to them and take away their science license).

[belfastuniguy 18]

In short, the Metric system is utterly superiorquote>

That's a matter of opinion and not completely correct either. Both can exist perfectly well in an intelligent society, understanding both is not that complicated really.

[beebs 129]

Originally posted by: belfastuniguy

In short, the Metric system is utterly superiorquote>

That's a matter of opinion and not completely correct either. Both can exist perfectly well in an intelligent society, understanding both is not that complicated really.

quote>

Ding ding ding..

I personally use:

Height (small): inches/cm interchangeably

Height (medium): feet

Height (tall): meters/km

Weight (biological): lbs

Weight (objects): g/kg

Liquids: mL/L

Temperature: C (although I can usually change things over to Fahrenheit pretty easily)

Much of Canada is pretty similar. Noone here knows their weight kg or their height in cm.

[Haljackey 17,398]

Originally posted by: belfastuniguy

In short, the Metric system is utterly superiorquote>

That's a matter of opinion and not completely correct either. Both can exist perfectly well in an intelligent society, understanding both is not that complicated really.

quote>

But if the entire world had one system, it would be even less complicated!  Its not a matter of opinion, its a matter of fact.

This reminds me of the time when the world had no time zones.  Some adopted the 24 hour clock, some didn't.  What this meant is that you would have to adjust your pocketwatch say 5 or 15 mins depending on where you were traveling to.  Sure, it wasn't that complicated, but it sure was waste!  Eventually, a universal 24 hour time zone was agreed upon.

Same goes for the metric/imperial conversions.  Its not really difficult, but would be so much easier if every country used the same system.

Best,

-Haljackey