The most official water costs $120k a gallon • Hacker News Board

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#31

Post by cyphar » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:45 PM UTC

sudb wrote: post #3

Reminds of me of the "most expensive peanut butter" at ~$2.44/g - sold by NIST, I assume for some sort of peanut butter factory process calibration: https://shop.nist.gov/ccrz__ProductDetails?sku=2387

For more context, sample reference materials from the NIST reference catalogue are not meant to be exceptionally high purity examples of the sample -- SRMs are usually commercially-produced products. The real value is that each sample comes with a datasheet with incredibly detailed and accurate measurements that are (as you said) used for calibration of measuring devices in industrial settings. To quote a Veritasium video about the topic from a few years ago[1], "the thing you're paying for is not the peanut butter, it's the knowledge of exactly what is in the peanut butter".

[1]: https://youtu.be/esQyYGezS7c?t=226

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#32

Post by SketchySeaBeast » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:48 PM UTC

TylerE wrote: post #22

warmdarksea wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is actually why i like fahrenheit the most... 0F is "really cold" and 100F is "really hot", whereas in celsius 0C is "kind of cold" and 100C is "uninhabitable". it makes sense for the 0-100 range to be reserved for temperatures frequently encountered in our habitat as humans i think...

Also for things like hvac temps Celsius is rather too coarse where as 1F is right around the perceivable difference.

There's nothing stopping the use of decimal points for Celsius. Though there's also nothing stopping decimal points in Fahrenheit, the rare instance where an imperial sub-unit doesn't make things go fucky.

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#33

Post by clickety_clack » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:50 PM UTC

warmdarksea wrote: post #18

artisinal wrote: post #5

This is why we should ditch Celsius for Kelvin. I never liked how we coupled 0 and 100 to where water freezes and boils under certain conditions. Kelvin doesn't rely on non-invariant reference points.

this is actually why i like fahrenheit the most... 0F is "really cold" and 100F is "really hot", whereas in celsius 0C is "kind of cold" and 100C is "uninhabitable". it makes sense for the 0-100 range to be reserved for temperatures frequently encountered in our habitat as humans i think...

I actually came around to Fahrenheit for the exact same reason. 0°F and 100°F are kind of the top and bottom of the temperature range I’m going to be experiencing and anything outside that is waaay too hot or cold. In Celsius a large portion of people have to flip to negative numbers regularly during the normal year, and everything between 45°C and 100°C is completely unused.

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#34

Post by tshaddox » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:50 PM UTC

buildsjets wrote: post #9

cjs_ac wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SRM 2387 pairs well with a cup of ISO 3103. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3103

Cap your meal off with a NIST 1196a standard issue cigarette? I am told they taste like drywall and taxes. https://www.nist.gov/news-events/news/2020/02/nist-releases-... Perhaps you would prefer some standard issue meat. https://www.sigmaaldrich.com/US/en/product/sial/nist1546a

It's only $508 per cigarette:

https://shop.nist.gov/ccrz__ProductDetails?sku=1196a&cclcl=e...

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#35

Post by 0cf8612b2e1e » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:53 PM UTC

ajmurmann wrote: post #19

warmdarksea wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is actually why i like fahrenheit the most... 0F is "really cold" and 100F is "really hot", whereas in celsius 0C is "kind of cold" and 100C is "uninhabitable". it makes sense for the 0-100 range to be reserved for temperatures frequently encountered in our habitat as humans i think...

This makes sense if weather is the main focus. For things like cooking Celsius is great though.

I am failing to understand why there would be a distinction. They all seem arbitrary set points you learn.

450F vs 230C does not feel like anything gets easier there. Maybe in some highly technical baking there are some nice deltas that appear?

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#36

Post by clickety_clack » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:54 PM UTC

ajmurmann wrote: post #19

warmdarksea wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is actually why i like fahrenheit the most... 0F is "really cold" and 100F is "really hot", whereas in celsius 0C is "kind of cold" and 100C is "uninhabitable". it makes sense for the 0-100 range to be reserved for temperatures frequently encountered in our habitat as humans i think...

This makes sense if weather is the main focus. For things like cooking Celsius is great though.

Aren’t you just remembering specific numbers though? Unless you’re trying to boil water unseen so that you can only see a thermometer, the specific 100°C mark isn't that useful.

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#37

Post by alehlopeh » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:54 PM UTC

artisinal wrote: post #26

throwatdem12311 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now do metric vs imperial.

Nothing screams freedom more than using ancient terms like horsepower and measuring tires in inches and percentages. The other day I heard an American talk about a TV being 65 inches. Took me a while to understand they had a 165 centimeter diagonal television.

Surely you mean tyres? It’s all arbitrary. Get over yourself.

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#38

Post by 0cf8612b2e1e » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 6:55 PM UTC

analog31 wrote: post #10

artisinal wrote: post #5

This is why we should ditch Celsius for Kelvin. I never liked how we coupled 0 and 100 to where water freezes and boils under certain conditions. Kelvin doesn't rely on non-invariant reference points.

I think that both the Celsius and Fahrenheit scales are now defined in terms of Kelvin and a formula. Most if not all of the units of measure are no longer related to their history except for an agreement to make the new units match the old ones at some point.

The US is technically metric in that the units are defined in terms of the metric equivalent. A US inch is exactly 2.54cm.

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#39

Post by thayne » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 7:02 PM UTC

rwmj wrote: post #17

Interesting article but left me wondering why they don't use ¹H₂¹⁶O as the "standard water"? Surely you can make that (relatively) easily in a centrifuge by spinning out the lightest fraction of water.

At the very least that has the advantage that it's possible to make more of it, so you aren't dependent on a limited sample of standard water.

Re: The most official water costs $120k a gallon

#40

Post by clickety_clack » Fri, Jul 31, 2026, 7:02 PM UTC

artisinal wrote: post #26

throwatdem12311 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now do metric vs imperial.

Nothing screams freedom more than using ancient terms like horsepower and measuring tires in inches and percentages. The other day I heard an American talk about a TV being 65 inches. Took me a while to understand they had a 165 centimeter diagonal television.

I bet you’d use lightyears over petametres or exametres though.