I don’t know why the U.S. gets shit for using the system that our colonial overlords forced us to use in the first place.
The only reason we’re still using it today is inertia. If we gradually tried phasing it out we’d have a lot more people on board with officially switching over to it versus the “ripping the band-aid” method of doing it all at once and causing culture shock to a bunch of ignorant Americans who haven’t done math since 8th grade.
Because nuance is useless when Europeans need to feel superior to us burgerlanders tm
I don’t know why the U.S. gets shit for using the system that our colonial overlords forced us to use in the first place.
When America was colonized, the metric system did not exist. Saying that your “colonial overlords” forced it on you is silly - there were no better options at the time.
In fact, the metric system was created after US independence. So the US can only blame itself for not adapting it, unlike the UK which mostly adapted it.
“In 1793, Thomas Jefferson requested equipment from France that could be used to evaluate the metric system within the United States. Joseph Dombey returned from France with a standard kilogram. Before reaching the United States, Dombey’s ship was blown off course by a storm and captured by pirates, or strictly (British) privateers in the Caribbean, he died in captivity on Montserrat.”
The US has been close several times. Most recently in the late 1980s. But it was an uphill battle by then. We had layers of government and mature private industry that had decades of work in the old system.
Before that, the US had essentially the same issue. Retooling in industry. The US was an early adopter of industrialization. The only other country with a similar position was Britain. They only adopted it in the 60s. Most importantly, it was industry led and a hybrid system retained for the general public. It’s funny to realize that many US agencies like the NIST.
The US was the first to adopt a decimal coin system which is part of metrificsrion. But because everyone does it, we don’t think about it. On the flip side, no one adopted the metric calendar and there’s never been an attempt to meaningfully move away from the mixed base time system.
I believe the USA had a vote in 1975 to switch to metric and failed.
Are you talking about the Metric Conversion Act of 1975? That passed.
In the 1821, John Quincy Addams (at the time secretary of state) was told to give congress a report on the new metric system. He presented them a very detailed document, making comparisons between the two, but ultimately recommending the metric system.
…so detailed, in fact, that none of them bothered to read it and no decision was made. The treasury ended up taking the initiative on their own, and went with what everyone was already using.
This was barley 30 years after the constitution was ratified, and the report was made by a guy who’s dad helped to draft the damn thing. We don’t get to blame the Brits for this one. Our stubborn anachronistic measurements are entirely a Yankee phenomenon.
According to my elementary /middle school-aged kids, it seems they are in fact learning the metric system in school. And this is in a red state in the south. 🤷♂️
~Check back in a couple of years and I can tell you what they’re doing in high school.~
Wow, that’s actually quite cool. Change will come from the ground up, imo. Good for them learning a better system. In another generation or two they will probably be the ones to spearhead the effort to do away with the old Imperial system entirely.
Metric has been a part of our science curriculum for a long time. There was even a push to change completely in the '70s until we figured out how much it would cost to do it. That’s why there are two liter sodas and why there’s one highway with kilometer markers instead of mile markers.
As for completely doing away with imperial, given that Europe hasn’t even entirely done that, it seems unlikely.
One can hope! In the meantime, they’re happy to teach this old dog new tricks and that’s a start.
In another generation or two they will probably be the ones to spearhead the effort [improve conditions in the United States]
this was said of the hippie generation (ie boomers) as well
IIRC metric is used extensively in scientific research.
Not true.
We use it when dealing drugs or making bullets, too.
We almost were the first to go metric. But also, the problem is we tried switching at the same time as the other English speaking countries. The difference is their population didn’t resist as hard. Had we committed we probably would’ve wound up about where canada is now
bc americans never changed but the overlords did
Our official kilogram weight and meter stick got stolen by pirates, and Copenhagen hasn’t sent a replacement.
“Why yes, can we order 1kg of kilogram and a 1m metre please?”
Remind me — what’s the definition of a meter?
The length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299792458 of a second.
Why?
Just trying to wrap my feeble American brain around these extremely intuitive measurements.
As opposed to the foot, a body part notorious for its consistency in size across all people /s
It’s good enough for an estimate of the size of a room, which is what it’s commonly used for.
Oh, really? You use your foot or your girlfriend’s? Because I wager those are somewhat different.
What body part is a quart based on? Because I don’t think it’s any of them, and you could probably still eyeball a quart of water. That’s to say, just shy of a litre.
How about one yard? Think you can do that? Great, just add a bit and you have a metre.
It’s crazy how Americans actually be complaining about how they’re unable to estimate or perceive things if they’re not actually measuring it against the bottom of their feet. Don’t you believe you have the ability to learn? I can see why you wouldn’t, but…
Americans actually be complaining
how are you attempting to disparage americans and talking like one at the same time. it’s just the name of a unit, who cares, a yard’s not the size of the boundary of their average house and barrels of oil don’t come in individual barrels
Because if I don’t assume their language, they won’t understand me, as my native language is Finnish. When talking to or about Americans, I might add a bit of American flare. It’s not grammatically correct, I know. Just double negatives.
Also criticism and disparagement are two different things.
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The sheer ignorance in this comment really makes the condescension even funnier.
It’s hard to realise the difference between what it’s origin is and definition. I think it’s wise to look into the definition of the foot instead of assuming you know.
Once finished, tell me why you still use the British unit?
Because they forced us to and it’s too expensive to change it now relative to the benefits.
It just needed to be able to be reconstructed without having an object standard. What is the actual length of a meter based on? A size that’s not only useful in scale, but that is both 1000x a useful measurement size and 1/1000th of a useful measurement size. It becomes intuitive when you start thinking in metric. It only took me like a month or two of mild effort to intuit a meter.
What is the definition of 1 foot imperial?
Oh yeah, 0.9144 meters.
Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299792458 of a second, where the second is defined by a hyperfine transition frequency of caesium.
Of course. It’s so obvious.
It’s not that bad once you accept that there is no correct answer for what should be considered “1 length” unless you want to use Planck units, which are absurdly uselessly large or small.
The metre was originally defined in 1791 by the French National Assembly as one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole along a great circle through Paris, setting 10000 km as that quarter of the Earth’s polar circumference.
There was the navigation rationale for setting the meter/metre at the length that it is, but the original and subsequent definitions proved to be inconsistent and difficult to measure precisely.
It’s also not accurate because one of the people who measured that distance made a small mistake in their calculations.
Half of yo mama’s waistline measurement.
A defense of the imperial measurement system.
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How many cubic inches are there in a gallon, without just looking it up?
Oh fuck I didn’t even get to volume mesurments, I knew the imperial system was fucked but until I actualy did some Wikipedia. Well my God what the fuck.
The video in question directly addresses that chart, correctly poining out that it’s quite misleading in the implication that the measurements on it are ever converted between in any context ever. But no, there is no context where someone converts between feet and miles, or uses sticks or hands or fingers or palms or chains or all those other units I promise you haven’t heard of. Imperial is bad, but it’s not that bad.
Similarly, it is completely irrelevant to know that a gallon is an integer number of cubic inches at all, that is a conversion that is simply never done.
In an apocalypse, the Imperial system of measurement is easier to reestablish than the metric system though that should be used with an eye to switching to metric. The USA uses both and it would be nice if things (like soda) didn’t have to list two measurements or having to ask a doctor to convert from metric to Imperial.
For scientific purposes, any system would be kinda hard to reestablish, without a definition that everyone agrees upon and a way to measure it accurately. The imperial system does not provide that definition at all.
For everyday purposes… what kind of apocalypse would result in the complete destruction of all of the world’s measuring tape?
what kind of apocalypse would result in the complete destruction of all of the world’s measuring tape?
The Empire Strikes Back apocalypse 🤣
For example, I can tell someone that the length between their knuckles of their index finger is about an inch or that a foot is literally based on the length of the human foot without having to have a ruler present. The metric system has no easy references. The history of the Imperial system is messy but it works (mostly) as a way to do rough measurements until the accuracy needed for the metric system is present. After that, the metric system makes conversions really easy, including getting rid of lot of units, and makes more sense.
Once you have the needed accuracy, the Imperial system is inferior to the metric system and should be phased out.
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Yup. One would start with that and then (hopefully) agree on a standard that is hopefully metric.
Yup. One would start with that
One would start measuring one meter using three feet, you mean? Until we can establish an exact measurement of one meter?
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If we’re knocked back to reinventing measurements we’ll probably reinvent the cubit along with the foot. If you’re building something by yourself you don’t need to be universally consistent, just internally so.
The USA uses both and it would be nice if things (like soda) didn’t have to list two measurements
The solution is to fully switch to metric
I agree. My point was about if a population needed to do a measurement system from the ground up.
And it’s a stupid point. A measurement system can’t “get lost”. There will always be artifacts left to reestablish it, like a piece of measuring tape or a cup with markings on it.
In an apocalypse, the Imperial system of measurement is easier to reestablish than the metric system
How would you measure one feet more accurately than one meter without any measurement tool? You might say that you could, but how can you prove that your “feet” measurement is more accurate than my “meter” measurement? Or one kilo vs one pound? You couldn’t. You would have to start with a brand new system either way.
And establishing a “new metric” system would be much easier, because everything is pretty just multiples of 10.
It’s not meant to be real accurate. It’s meant to “do for now”. There’s a reason that the metric system took so long to come into existence. We have the advantage of hindsight. Any society starting over might not have access to that experience.
I prefer using bananas to feet though. Both are just as accurate measurement tools.
Metric would be easier to re-establish exactly because we have hindsight and prior knowledge of it. Everything is basically just multiples of 10, once you establish the base measurement.
There are 3 countries that use the SAE (Imperial?) measuring system. Liberia, Myanmar and the USA. Exactly, WTF!?!?!
Both the meter and the second were created from a step length, just like the mile.
Second is a measure of time. You think its “the time it take for one step”… ?
A day is divided into hours. An hour is divided into smaller pisces, minute pieces. (See how it works as an adjective and a noun?) Then that measure is divided a second time, into secunda pars minuta
That’s why they’re minutes and seconds.
Metres don’t exactly sound like step lengths either
The mètre was introduced – defined as one ten-millionth of the shortest distance from the North Pole to the equator passing through Paris, assuming an Earth flattening of 1/334.
Ever wondered where those magic numbers on that definition come from?
But no, I misremembered it, the relation between the step and a second is a coincidence. It’s the size of the meter that was decided in function of time, in the division that best approximated a step.
I actually went through the entire pdf. Didn’t read all of it, but browsed through and read the parts I though relate to this.
I can’t find anything about the metre ever being from “natural measurements”. Only that the people looking to make the metre debated the subject. But the metre itself was always based on the size of the Earth. But yeah, it’s close to a yard and a yard is 3 feet.
Ofc originally all measurements somehow derive from our bodies, because that’s the first thing we measured with. But like the pdf quite quickly says:
It is universally accepted that the first important stage in the development of metro- logical concepts related to measures of length is the anthropomorphic one, in which the main units of measurement are the parts of the human body [3, 4]. As the sociologist and historian of metrology Witold Kula puts it, “man measures the world with him- self” [4] — a variation of Protagoras’ “man is the measure of all things”. It is a very ancient and primitive approach. Certainly, even the first people who adopted such units must have been aware that the length of their own feet or fingers was different from their neighbor’s ones. But initially such personal differences did not seem important, given the low degree of accuracy required in measurements in that social context. Later the anthropomorphic approach reached a first level of abstraction, charac- terized by “the shift from concrete representations to abstract ones, from ‘my or your finger’ to ‘finger in general’ ” 4 [4]. Nevertheless, even when the stage was reached of conceiving measurement units as abstract concepts, differences in establishing the value of these units remained, depending on region or time [6, 7, 8, 9]. Only in the eighteenth century, with the consolidation of the experimental method on one hand, and the drive towards international co-operation and trading on the other, 3All English quotes not referring to English bibliography are translation by the authors. 4The earliest measurement standard we have evidence of is the Egyptian cubit, the length of the forearm from elbow to fingers, realized around 2500 B.C. in a piece of marble of about 50 centimeters [5]. 2 strong emphasis was placed for the first time on the need for standardized units
] one would still have to include an heterogeneous element, time, or what is here the same thing, the intensity of the gravitational force at the Earth’s surface. Now, if it is possible to have a unit of length that does not depend on any other quantity, it seems natural to prefer it.27 [. . . ] Actually, it is much more natural to refer the distance between two places to a quarter of one of the terrestrial circles than to refer it to the length of the pendulum. [. . . ] The quarter of the Earth meridian would become then the real unit of length; and the ten million-th part of this length would be its practical unit. (Ref [2], pp. 4-5)
Ugh I’m not gonna format all that. I’m not like trying to say you’re wrong. I’m asking you what you’re trying to say?
Maybe this is the US’s plan all along… to tariff the metric system into submission.
