Hae-Yu
10-16-2006, 02:12 PM
This started up in Papa Smurf's thread, but I didn't want to hijack it.
Napoleon (the megalomaniac) instituted the metric system. The metric system is still as arbitrary as the Imperial/ standard system. What's worse is, though it has become supposedly more "scientific" it is divorced from common usage. You cannot eyeball most metric. The only things easier are remembering deci, centi, milli, etc. and converting between units but that's just laziness. Just because the rest of the world uses it, doesn't make it better.
In real life, it's easier to divide something up into 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16. You can divide a quadrangle into thirds easily too. Divide a cake into 10 equal pieces.
The Imperial system was based on common usage and everything can be eyeballed.
1 cup=4 mouthfuls. Pint=2 cups. 1 quart=2 pints. 4 quarts=1 gallon. A peck =2 gallons. A bushel=4 pecks. A cask=2 bushels. A barrel=2 casks. 8 barrels= ton/ tun. I don't know all the intermediate measures, but it was always x2 from mouthful to ton.
A grain was the basic unit of measurement with a # of barley grains equal to ounces, pounds, tons.
A foot is a foot long. A cubit is a forearm long (elbow to fingertip) and a yard is 2 forearms long. A fathom is 6'. A rod is 20'. A chain is 80'. A league is 3 miles - an hour's walk. A mile was 1000 steps, but changed to 8 furlongs or 80 chains to make it even.
A furlong is 1 furrow long - how much was plowed between rests - 10 chains. An acre (1 field) was 1 furlong x 4 chains: how much you could plow in a day. Sure these are now difficult, but at one time, most people understood them because it was everyday. Metric is learned similarly, but EVERYTHING has to be learned.
How do you eyeball a meter? Hey Paul, does that look to be 1/10,000,000th from the equator to the pole? Yeah sure, Bob. A kilogram is easier if you happen to have a liter of water nearby at sea level. But since the official standard weighs less than it did 100 years ago, what good is it?
I have to work in metric quite a bit. It works fine for things which you can't eyeball or guesstimate like electricity, rf, light, etc.
Napoleon (the megalomaniac) instituted the metric system. The metric system is still as arbitrary as the Imperial/ standard system. What's worse is, though it has become supposedly more "scientific" it is divorced from common usage. You cannot eyeball most metric. The only things easier are remembering deci, centi, milli, etc. and converting between units but that's just laziness. Just because the rest of the world uses it, doesn't make it better.
In real life, it's easier to divide something up into 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16. You can divide a quadrangle into thirds easily too. Divide a cake into 10 equal pieces.
The Imperial system was based on common usage and everything can be eyeballed.
1 cup=4 mouthfuls. Pint=2 cups. 1 quart=2 pints. 4 quarts=1 gallon. A peck =2 gallons. A bushel=4 pecks. A cask=2 bushels. A barrel=2 casks. 8 barrels= ton/ tun. I don't know all the intermediate measures, but it was always x2 from mouthful to ton.
A grain was the basic unit of measurement with a # of barley grains equal to ounces, pounds, tons.
A foot is a foot long. A cubit is a forearm long (elbow to fingertip) and a yard is 2 forearms long. A fathom is 6'. A rod is 20'. A chain is 80'. A league is 3 miles - an hour's walk. A mile was 1000 steps, but changed to 8 furlongs or 80 chains to make it even.
A furlong is 1 furrow long - how much was plowed between rests - 10 chains. An acre (1 field) was 1 furlong x 4 chains: how much you could plow in a day. Sure these are now difficult, but at one time, most people understood them because it was everyday. Metric is learned similarly, but EVERYTHING has to be learned.
How do you eyeball a meter? Hey Paul, does that look to be 1/10,000,000th from the equator to the pole? Yeah sure, Bob. A kilogram is easier if you happen to have a liter of water nearby at sea level. But since the official standard weighs less than it did 100 years ago, what good is it?
I have to work in metric quite a bit. It works fine for things which you can't eyeball or guesstimate like electricity, rf, light, etc.