Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

thefabricator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 422 posts

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#141

Post by anonymars »

master_crab wrote: post #99
JKCalhoun wrote: post #77

"Back when I was a Catholic-school kid in northern Wisconsin, my school lessons briefly focused on the metric system. This was in the late 1970s." Man, the progressive school (Comanche Elementary in Overland Park, Kansas!) must have had a huge impact on my life. In addition to open classrooms (I was in Unit 5, not 4th Grade), team teaching, a focus on experimental science, a circular layout to the school with a sunke…

It was there again in the 90s after the wall fell. Fukuyama was boldly proclaiming the “end of history.” Newt started to kick at the edges with his combative policies but the inertia continued until the dotcom crash and 9/11 came along, and fully ended with the Great Recession.* * (From my viewpoint as a millennial. Gen Z might think the golden years were during Obama, or just pre-COVID. To some extent every generati…

The Daily Show did a segment on this. I can't find the clip but the title was "Even Better Than the Real Thing" and it was with John Oliver. Anyway the conclusion was "the good old days when life was simpler" are inevitably "when you were a child" -- it would be interesting to see how that holds up with others

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#142

Post by kakacik »

gonzalohm wrote: post #89
threemux wrote: post #62

I'd part with cups and teaspoons/tablespoons and the like, but you'll pry inches/feet/yards and fahrenheit from my cold, dead hands. They're both more convenient for daily use. I think I'd prefer to keep miles as well but I don't have a good reason for that one. Fahrenheit has more precision without using decimals for the thing 99% of people are using temperature measurements for: air temp. Where I live, we generally…

Interesting. As an European living in the US. The only US units that I find useful are cups, teaspoons and tablespoons. And that's only for cooking. It's way faster to measure volume than weight (although less accurate)

Those are not US measures, we use them in Europe as well

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#143

Post by ericmay »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #137
ericmay wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You think Frank Lloyd Wright designed big picture windows and open floor plans because he was afraid of humanity? He was afraid so he tried to induce fear? No, I was speaking about the exterior. The blending in of the surroundings, and hiding of things like the entrance are the hallmark of post-war architectural trends. Not that I'm claiming Lloyd suffered from the same PTSD that returning American veterans did, bu…

Yes please, for the sources on assymetrical architecture and stress. That's totally new to me, and I'd love to read about it.

Cognitive Architecture by Ann Sussman is probably the best single book about this topic that I've found.

https://annsussman.com

You may find this lecture of interest. I'm sorry I don't have anything shorter to read offhand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPjezxPl3FA

-edit- This might get you closer though to the general theory:

https://asla-ncc.org/the-built-environment-impacts-our-healt...

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#144

Post by amanaplanacanal »

etiennebausson wrote: post #102
flohofwoe wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They're both more convenient for daily use. That's really just because you're used to it. The rest is rationalization... OTH of course the rest of the world can hardly complain since we didn't switch time or (angle-)degrees to decimal either ;)

Not switching to metric for time is reasonable, because there are already two existing 'natural' units for time (the day and the year), and they don't align on each other in metric (a year of exactly 1000 days would be so much easier, but we'll have to deal with reality as it is... or accelerate the rotation speed of the planet I suppose). So long as we live on earth, metric time won't make much sense.

A year and a day don't line up at all, so we get weird leap days.

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#145

Post by Ekaros »

vidarh wrote: post #34
jxdxbx wrote: post #2

The metric systems's worse flaw was doubling down on base 10 instead of the plainly superior base 12.

Unless everyone worked in base 12 numbers too, that'd be a mess. Part of the beauty of metric is how often calculations devolve to shifting the decimal point.

And nothing really prevents metric system from working in base-12. Ofc base 12 kilometre would be larger than base-10. But it still would work.

Base 10 really is used because our number system is base 10. And more so base 1000. Apart from some cultures.

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#146

Post by its_ethan »

plaguna wrote: post #44
sarchertech wrote: post #38

The problem is that Fahrenheit is a bit more convenient for describing the weather. Inches and feet are a bit more convenient for measuring human scale things and for being easily divisible by more numbers. And we’re used to the rest of it. Unless someone comes along and forces it on you, for the average person, there’s not enough incentive to switch.

"Fahrenheit is a bit more convenient for describing the weather" - you might need to show us an example here that is not biased. Because to me, Celsius is a bit more convenient for describing the weather.

0 degrees F is a cold winter day, 100 degrees F is a hot summer day

0 degrees C is a cold winter day, 100 degrees C means you're dead

I think he's suggesting that a 0-100 scale for temperature/"relative warmth outside" is more intuitive than a 0-37 scale. It's easier to to place 73 degrees on a 0-100 relative warmth scale than it is to place 18 degrees on a 0-37 scale (unless of course you grew up calibrated to the 0-37 scale and know that 18degrees means you maybe need a light jacket or whatever).

I think it's funny that one of the main benefits of metric is its base-10-ness where things scale so nicely from 1-10-100-1000 etc. but then for temperature we're supposed to be fine with a 0-37? Fahrenheit is basically the 1-100 version of temperature (when it comes to weather).

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#147

Post by sandbach »

ericmay wrote: post #86
JKCalhoun wrote: post #77

"Back when I was a Catholic-school kid in northern Wisconsin, my school lessons briefly focused on the metric system. This was in the late 1970s." Man, the progressive school (Comanche Elementary in Overland Park, Kansas!) must have had a huge impact on my life. In addition to open classrooms (I was in Unit 5, not 4th Grade), team teaching, a focus on experimental science, a circular layout to the school with a sunke…

> Yeah, we went over the Metric System that whole year. I can still sing the "Metric Family" song from the film on metric units ("Kilo", "Milli", etc.). And to my young an impressionable mind, the U.S. was joining the rest of the world "Free World" in a kind of Star-Trek-like casting aside of the old things that divided us—joining each other with a focus on progress, science, space… I’ve always found this peculiar be…

Banksy??

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#148

Post by amanaplanacanal »

mschild wrote: post #68
alkonaut wrote: post #47

Having converted science, manufacturing etc, what's the first (or next) true consumer facing thing that could change?

Grocery sizes. In fact, a lot of them already have it on the items. Typically because a lot of products are also sold in Canada so they put the ml measurement next to the gallons.

When I go to buy liquor it seems to already be mostly in metric, sizes are 500ml, 750ml, and liter.

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#149

Post by technothrasher »

ericmay wrote: post #86
JKCalhoun wrote: post #77

"Back when I was a Catholic-school kid in northern Wisconsin, my school lessons briefly focused on the metric system. This was in the late 1970s." Man, the progressive school (Comanche Elementary in Overland Park, Kansas!) must have had a huge impact on my life. In addition to open classrooms (I was in Unit 5, not 4th Grade), team teaching, a focus on experimental science, a circular layout to the school with a sunke…

> Yeah, we went over the Metric System that whole year. I can still sing the "Metric Family" song from the film on metric units ("Kilo", "Milli", etc.). And to my young an impressionable mind, the U.S. was joining the rest of the world "Free World" in a kind of Star-Trek-like casting aside of the old things that divided us—joining each other with a focus on progress, science, space… I’ve always found this peculiar be…

> the useful scale of Fahrenheit is far superior 0-100 versus 0-32.

Well, first of all, I'm not sure why you're defining those scales as the "useful" ones. They don't even equate to each other. But why are you arbitrarily using 100 as the end of your Fahrenheit scale? Just so you can declare it 'Metric-y'? If you read his paper, Fahrenheit's scale is actually 0-96.

Re: The super-slow conversion of the U.S. to metric (2025)

#150

Post by throwway120385 »

relaxing wrote: post #123
cucumber3732842 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The unit itself doesn't actually matter. Even industries with the least precision set their stuff up with so much precision that the unit you use basically doesn't matter. Your machine may spit out widgets that are plus or minus an inch. But when you set up the machine you set it up to the 1/16 regardless. Swapping all that to metric doesn't actually change anything other than the number the guy setting it up dials i…

1/16” is just over 1.5 mm, so yes, the guy setting the machine in millimeters is giving you more precision. In the real world measurements aren’t just abstract figures you can move around losslessly. I have a socket set in half-millimeter sizes for the absolute plague of cheap bolts and nuts that are being manufactured with obscene levels of slop.

He's not giving you more accuracy though. A machine that's accurate to 1/32" is accurate to .75mm. If those cheap bolts were in US customary they would still need to be in smaller increments.
Post reply on HN