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John VanSickle wrote:
> Darren New wrote:
>> I must say, having spent another couple weeks in Europe, metric
>> measurements for food and drink no longer seem awkward to me. :-)
>
> One week of physics class cured me of all distaste for the metric system.
I never disliked metric in the science classes. I actually have a better
feel for how much a kilogram weighs than a pounds, and a better feel for
centimeters than inches. (I even think of a "pound" as "somewhat less
than half a kilo", when I pick up a rock or something.)
It just seemed inconvenient for everyday things like food, where it's a
rough estimate rather than a precise measure. But that seems to have
been simply unfamiliarity.
--
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
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Jim Holsenback wrote:
> You know what I find odd is that lumber and plumbing pipe is still sold by
> inches and feet, (government projects get converted) but
> temp/rain/snowfall, highway signs, and liquid measure are metric. Is anyones
> system mixed like that?
Well, airplane stuff still uses feet everywhere (and english for ATC,
etc). Which is why the Mars probe crashed.
In China, apparently there's a "chinese foot" that's a third of a meter,
a "chinese inch" that's 2 cm, and a few other things like that. Metric
approximations to empirical units. Which I thought was pretty funky.
--
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
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Invisible wrote:
> Not to mention people's weight and height (but not clothing
> measurements, oddly enough).
Oh, tell me about clothing in the USA. Where women's sizes get larger
and larger for the same number. My wife has gone from a 6 to a 4 to a 2,
just by *not* getting fat. :-)
> Until recently most food was sold in
> imperial units. AFAIK wood is still sold as "two-be-four". ;-)
And where it's sold in metric units, I understand, it's sold in lengths
of (for example) 120 cm, rather than a meter, because you can't cut a
meter in thirds.
--
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
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Vincent Le Chevalier escreveu:
> Invisible a écrit :
>>
>> I know I'm 6'2" tall (to the nearest 1/16"), but I have no idea what
>> that is in metric. (Very roughly 1.5m, AFAIK.)
>
> No that would be 1.88m. Your estimation is more like 5'2", maybe you
> computed that a few years ago ;-)
>
yeah, with 1.5 m he'd be kind of a midget. :P
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There's one thing where imperial units beat the metric system, and it's
that their names *sound* better, at least in English.
For example an expression like "it went for miles and miles" sounds a
lot more fluent than "it went for kilometers and kilometers". (Or is it
"kilometres"? You see, there's even confusion in that...)
Likewise: "It missed me by mere inches" sounds more fluent than "it
missed me by mere centimeters".
Maybe this is simply because I have seen too many Hollywood movies.
--
- Warp
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Warp wrote:
> Maybe this is simply because I have seen too many Hollywood movies.
Actually, that was part of the awkwardness I was talking about in my
first rant on the subject. :-)
Does anyone really say "klick" for kilometers? "Three klicks down the
road" I've read in fiction books, but never heard outside of that.
--
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
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On 14-Oct-08 19:59, Darren New wrote:
> Invisible wrote:
>> Not to mention people's weight and height (but not clothing
>> measurements, oddly enough).
>
> Oh, tell me about clothing in the USA. Where women's sizes get larger
> and larger for the same number. My wife has gone from a 6 to a 4 to a 2,
> just by *not* getting fat. :-)
>
>> Until recently most food was sold in imperial units. AFAIK wood is
>> still sold as "two-be-four". ;-)
>
> And where it's sold in metric units, I understand, it's sold in lengths
> of (for example) 120 cm, rather than a meter, because you can't cut a
> meter in thirds.
>
My best estimate is that by cutting a meter in thirds would give three
pieces of about 33.2 cm. I might be missing the point, however.
I wouldn't be surprised if the 1.2 meter is just somewhat close to 4
feet. Although if I did not miss your point, you are going to argue that
you can't cut those in thirds either. OTOH you might end up with three
pieces of about 16 inches.
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On Tue, 14 Oct 2008 14:54:07 +0100, Invisible wrote:
> Jim Holsenback wrote:
>
>> Is anyones system mixed like that?
>
> Yes.
I always found it weird in the UK that distances are in miles and mileage
seems to be in MPG (but imperial gallons), but the purchase of petrol is
by the litre.
That makes it *really* difficult to figure out fuel efficiency if you
don't have a computer to do that in your car.
Jim
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Darren New <dne### [at] san rrcom> wrote:
> Does anyone really say "klick" for kilometers? "Three klicks down the
> road" I've read in fiction books, but never heard outside of that.
Never heard.
In finnish the words kilometer and centimeter don't sound so awkward as
in English, perhaps because they are basically the only measures used.
(Also "centimeters" can usually be shortened to the equivalent of "cents",
and there's a shorter slang word for "kilometer", although it's not as
often used.)
--
- Warp
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On 14 Oct 2008 14:57:39 -0400, Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
>
>I always found it weird in the UK that distances are in miles and mileage
>seems to be in MPG (but imperial gallons), but the purchase of petrol is
>by the litre.
You mean that imperial doesn't mean American? <g>
>That makes it *really* difficult to figure out fuel efficiency if you
>don't have a computer to do that in your car.
Only if you're innumerate :P
--
Regards
Stephen
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