Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!ut-sally!husc6!bloom-beacon!oberon!sdcrdcf!trwrb!scgvaxd!wlbr!etn-rad!jru From: jru@etn-rad.UUCP (John Unekis) Newsgroups: sci.misc Subject: metric system Message-ID: <238@etn-rad.UUCP> Date: Wed, 5-Aug-87 14:42:21 EDT Article-I.D.: etn-rad.238 Posted: Wed Aug 5 14:42:21 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 8-Aug-87 10:43:34 EDT Reply-To: jru@etn-rad.UUCP (0000-John Unekis) Distribution: sci.misc Organization: Eaton Inc. IMSD, Westlake Village, CA Lines: 169 Summary:reposting from sci.space In article <2560002@hpclrk.HP.COM> rajiv@hpclrk.HP.COM writes: > > >One more observation. > I seem to believe that the reason US does not switch to SI is largely >economic. In US, most industry bluprints are based on FPS system. The >workers only know how to add "40 pounds of a ceratin catalyst". If today ...(more words)... >not know how much a liter is but it is ok because there is not *one* place >on the whole USA which will sell them gas by liters only. So everybody is ........ The reason that the U.S. doesn't switch to the metric system is because legislators are afraid of being voted out of office if they force their constituents to engage in any form of mental activity more strenuous than watching DALLAS. People in the U.S. handle weights and measures intuitively, but since the metric system is decimal in nature, they are afraid that they would be forced to learn to multiply and divide in their heads. What is needed is a common man's metric system, one which allows intuitive measurement without mathematics. therefore .... THE INTUITIVE METRIC SYSTEM --------------------------- Volume: Most Americans know of only two measures of volume, the gallon(because milk and gasoline come that way), and the cup(because they drink from it). Some gifted individuals can recognize a quart, either because they know how much is in a can of motor oil, or because they buy their milk in small containers that say one quart on them. Well folks , think of quarts, because the main unit of volume in the metric system is a LITER, which for all practical purposes is a quart. If you can't remember quarts, try 4 liters in a galllon, or 1/4 liter in a cup. Distance: To the average American, there are several types of distances. Distances from one place to another- these are measured in miles, which are meaninglessly huge, except that one mile takes one minute to drive on the freeway( at 60 miles per hour). In the metric system we use kilometers, which are just over half a mile. They take about 36 seconds to drive on the freeway( at 100 kilometers per hour). Since the kilometer is smaller than the mile, places will now be farther apart, but thats OK because you will get to drive faster(won't it be nice to see your speedometer say 100) . Distances to objects in view- these are measured in yards, one yard is one big step, 100 yards is a football field. In the metric system, there is very little change. The medium distance measure will be the METER. A meter is so close to a yard that you won't notice the change. Sizes of large objects - these are measured in feet, and maybe sometimes yards. A foot is the size of common objects like a notebook, or a magazine. Most people use feet primarily to measure their own height (or feet and inches). In the metric system , there are no feet, we have to use meters again. They are not so hard to get used to, though. President Reagen is two meters tall. The front door on your house is probably just about a meter wide. Sizes of small objects - these are measured in inches. Some larger objects that we wish were smaller are measured in inches too (like our waistlines). An inch is the distance between our fingers when we hold them one inch apart. In the metric system, we use centimeters. A centimeter is just under half an inch, or about the thickness of a regular pencil. This has some advantages and disadvantages. One advantage is that you are over twice as tall as you were in inches(6 ft. = 72 inches = 180 cm) , but you are also over twice as fat (34 inch waist = 84 cm waist). Oh, well, you can't win em all. Weight: Most Americans have almost no intuitive feel for weight. Pick up the the coffee cup on your desk and hand it to someone. Ask them how much it weighs and you will get guesses ranging from 1 ounce to 10 pounds. The only weight which has any meaning to an American is their body weight. If you are a man , this is about 200 pounds, but since you haven't bothered to weigh yourself in 20 years , you still think its about 150. If you are a woman, you weigh yourself daily, and know that you weigh about 125 pounds, but you only admit to 110 of them. In the metric system, there is good news. We switch to kilograms, which are equal to over 2 pounds(2.2 actually). This means you will soon weigh less than half what you do now, without dieting. A man will come in at about 90 kg, and a woman at about 55 (admit to 50). One other miscelllaneous weight which a few Americans are concerned with is the ounce. This is hard to deal with because it is both a measure of volume and of weight ( amazingly enough, almost no one realizes that one ounce(liquid) of water weighs exactly one ounce(weight) by definition). The ounce is mentioned here because it the amount that a letter which takes one 22 cent stamp weighs. In the metric system we switch to grams. A gram is about the weight of a stick of Trident chewing gum. You can put about twenty eight of them in the mail for one 22 cent stamp. Temperature (thanks to Amos Shapir): To most Americans temperature is an entirely subjective measurement, the most important unit of which is too( as in 'its too hot' or 'its too cold'). The official scale is degrees farenheit, where 32 degrees F is the freezing point of water and 212 is the boiling point (as if anyone cared). Farenheit is based on an historical accident and is calibrated from the accidental top and bottom of a thermometer made by some guy hundreds of years ago. This thermometer has since been copied by every dime store in the universe and is sold for about 5 cents, making Farenheit easily accessible to everyone. In the metric system, we use degrees centigrade. The centigrade scale was deliberately based on an easily obtained scale, the freezing point (0 degrees) and boiling point (100 degrees) of water. Since these things vary with both altitude and the purity of the water, they are almost impossible to get right without precise scietific lab equipment and thus have been embraced by the scientific community. In order to make centigrade useful to the common folks, a conversion chart is included that converts from Farenheit to Centigrade to the Too scale. Farenheit Centigrade Too --------- --------- ---- 212 100 Too hot to drink 100 38 Too hot to go outside, stay in where its air conditioned 72 23 Perfect 50 10 Too chilly to go out without a sweater 32 0 To cold to go out without a coat 0 (and below) -18 Too damn cold for almost anything NOW YOU KNOW THE INTUITIVE METRIC SYSTEM Now when somebody tells you that a spaceship has 6 million kilograms of thrust you can file that fact in the special place in your brain ( just like UNIX /dev/null ) which is reserved for incomprehensibly large figures like the distance to the sun, and the weight of the moon. The nice thing about international standardization is that we may not understand the world around us any better, but at least we can all miscomprehend it in the same units. ----------------------------------------------------------------- the opinions above were my own when I thought of them, by tomorrow they may belong to someone else. ihnp4!wlbr!etn-rad!jru