It's time for the US to use the metric system

Post by grahamel » Fri, May 30, 2014, 2:05 PM UTC

kjjw wrote: post #22

grahamel wrote: post #15

The UK is supposedly metric most people still think and talk in imperial - most shops give both measurements. I think the EU gave up enforcing it. edit: sorry, by most people I mean people I know who grew up before metric was introduced.

Really does not paint a true picture. Living in the UK I use metric for everything except driving distances, driving speed and measures of beer (pints). And what measurements are still signed / represented in some way in imperial measurements in the UK? Road signs, speedometers and beer at a bar in a pub. Everything else is presented in metric and everybody I know uses metric for everything else.

Post by blencdr » Fri, May 30, 2014, 2:09 PM UTC

sjwright wrote: post #86

IgorPartola wrote: post #65

I challenge you all to make two changes today with regard to this. First, switch your phone to give you the weather in Celsius. It gets super simple fast: 0 and below - Freezing. Wear a warm jacket and closed toe shoes or boots. 1 - 10 - Cold. Wear an overcoat (a light one if you are used to colder weather) 10-15 - Early spring time. Long sleeves are probably in order, maybe even a sweater. 15-20 - Late spring. Wear…

> I am deliberately not giving conversions to Fahrenheit But I spent all that effort learning what temperature water boils at in Fahrenheit. Who the hell is going to remember what that temperature is in Celsius??

Post by pmontra » Fri, May 30, 2014, 2:14 PM UTC

ds9 wrote: post #82

bane wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When we're young we're taught the imperial method since it's the customary system. Once we start getting into science classes it's all metric. Still, outside of science classes (and the military) we don't use it at all. Which means we don't have a good working model in our heads of what a kg feels like or how warm a 30 degC day is...that sort of thing. I think most Americans have a pretty good feel for what a liter i…

Amusingly, the areas where the most US Americans are familiar with SI are gun calibers and recreational drugs. [n] (OK, I may have a warped sense of humor, but it's true) n. (not taught in schools)

Post by soneca » Fri, May 30, 2014, 2:17 PM UTC

bane wrote: post #78

sophacles wrote: post #53

Some thoughts on a conversion that I don't generally see brought up: * From an economic standpoint, the US is a big enough market that it is profitable to make things in weird US units, you have 350M people to sell to, most of whom are pretty well off by world standards. It makes sense to make a line catering to them. If businesses can start making a true or good economic argument it will happen more. * Tooling that…

To be honest, the U.S. really should have switched during the late 19thor very early 20th century before the benefits of the industrial revolution gave us so much stuff that needs to be converted. Even if we converted tomorrow, we'd still be dragging around imperial measures for decades, maybe a century. I can't see cooking or property measurements making the transition within my grandchildren's lifetimes. In most co…

Post by kourt » Fri, May 30, 2014, 2:21 PM UTC

williwu wrote: post #63

While you are at can you change the date format as well? DD/MM/YYYY instead of MM/DD/YYYY (US). It should go from small to big. The other way around makes my head hurts every time.