I think we should over time look to gradually switch over. But over time it might become a necessity anyway, with how everything is becoming globalized. I learned the metric system in school but since I don't use it, it just faded from memory. I could never get used to it either. Like with height for instance, feet just always seemed to make more sense. I also like the weather in Farenheit. The 0-100 scale just seems more logical to me in my head, or maybe it's just because I'm more used to it.
Should the US switch to the Metric system?
- Thread starter calpoon
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it's not difficult to ues both. my 37 inch tv was supplied with 1.5 metre leads.
Fuck no, what the fuck is the metric system anyway?
Socialism!!!! Get it! You start using the metric system, what next? The Gov'ment will be pushing you around telling you where to kneel where to ****, what to eat! Fuck that!!!
Down with the metric system and all those commie fucks that use it everywhere else!
Socialism!!!! Get it! You start using the metric system, what next? The Gov'ment will be pushing you around telling you where to kneel where to ****, what to eat! Fuck that!!!
Down with the metric system and all those commie fucks that use it everywhere else!
So does that mean we switch over to metric time too? Or how about a metric calender? Working 10 days with only one day off?
It's probably inevitable, and I think the leaders should be considering moves to help phase it in over time. Just about anything that has a weight or volume on the label already shows the metric equivalent. Engineers and scientists all use metric. Coming from a construction background I can tell you it's way easier to just read off a number of millimeters than to figure out what fraction of an inch you're looking at, not to mention that every measurement is just a single number instead of a numerator and denominator.
Here is a comparison of the derivation of some units of measurement:
Temperature
Celsius: 0 is the freezing point of pure water at standard pressure, 100 is the boiling point of the same water.
Fahrenheit: 0 is the freezing point of some random saline solution that was thought to be absolute zero hundreds of years ago. 96 is the temperature of freshly drawn horses *****.
Distance
Meter: the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second.
Millimeter: one thousandth of a meter.
Kilometer: one thousand meters.
Inch: Originally the "width of a man's thumbnail, measured at the base," is now defined as 25.4 MILLIMETERS.
Foot: Originally the "length of a man's foot," now defined as 304.8 MILLIMETERS.
Yard: Considered by some to have originated as the girth of a person's waist, or designated by Henry 1st of England as the distance from the tip of his nose to the tip of his thumb, now defined as 914.4 MILLIMETERS(see a pattern here?)
Mile: 5280 feet(there's a nice round number!)
Weight
Kilogram: the mass of a liter of pure water at standard temperature and pressure.
Pound: Derived from several random weight measures, this has been standardized to 0.45359237 kilograms.
Volume
Liter: one cubic decimeter (0.001 cubic meters)
Gallon: 231 cubic inches (another nice round number)
Quart: quarter of a gallon (57.75 cubic inches)
Which system makes more sense?
Here is a comparison of the derivation of some units of measurement:
Temperature
Celsius: 0 is the freezing point of pure water at standard pressure, 100 is the boiling point of the same water.
Fahrenheit: 0 is the freezing point of some random saline solution that was thought to be absolute zero hundreds of years ago. 96 is the temperature of freshly drawn horses *****.
Distance
Meter: the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second.
Millimeter: one thousandth of a meter.
Kilometer: one thousand meters.
Inch: Originally the "width of a man's thumbnail, measured at the base," is now defined as 25.4 MILLIMETERS.
Foot: Originally the "length of a man's foot," now defined as 304.8 MILLIMETERS.
Yard: Considered by some to have originated as the girth of a person's waist, or designated by Henry 1st of England as the distance from the tip of his nose to the tip of his thumb, now defined as 914.4 MILLIMETERS(see a pattern here?)
Mile: 5280 feet(there's a nice round number!)
Weight
Kilogram: the mass of a liter of pure water at standard temperature and pressure.
Pound: Derived from several random weight measures, this has been standardized to 0.45359237 kilograms.
Volume
Liter: one cubic decimeter (0.001 cubic meters)
Gallon: 231 cubic inches (another nice round number)
Quart: quarter of a gallon (57.75 cubic inches)
Which system makes more sense?
And where the fuck did they come up with 212 (yet another nice, round number)? :dunno:
ChefChiTown
The secret ingredient? MY BALLS
In the United States? NOT the metric system.
ChefChiTown
The secret ingredient? MY BALLS
So is the system we already have in place. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
I'm actually somewhat lucky, because I have to know portions of the metric system. I need to know conversions when it comes to the weight of food and the amount of liquids for when I place orders. Even though I KNOW the metric system, it's still annoying to have to convert everything.
:2 cents:
What I like about the metric system in this global world is that it's standard across the board, instead of countries having their own different versions of the same measurement. Hence you don't have to convert U.S tons to imperial tons, or U.S gallons to imperial gallons (I wouldn't know where to start on that one).
Metric is also far easier in calculations, you don't have to know how many inches in a yard, ounces in a pound, square yards in an acre etc. Everything is just 10 x 10.
And finally, to help you convert, just remember: two and a quarter pounds of jam, weighs about a kilogram. Simples. :wave2:
Metric is also far easier in calculations, you don't have to know how many inches in a yard, ounces in a pound, square yards in an acre etc. Everything is just 10 x 10.
And finally, to help you convert, just remember: two and a quarter pounds of jam, weighs about a kilogram. Simples. :wave2:
So you understand how the rest of the world feels when dealing with America then.
ChefChiTown
The secret ingredient? MY BALLS
Kind of like how Americans have to deal with people speaking other countries' languages? Try dealing with that on a daily basis and then tell me how annoying our system of measurement is, because it won't compare.
"Hey Jose, where is the chicken?"
"Que?"
"Where is the chicken?"
"Que?"
"SIGH, where is the fucking chicken?"
"Que?"
"For fuck's sake...DONDE ES POLLO?"
"Oh, well why didn't you say so? The chicken's in the cooler."
"Was that so hard?"
"...que?"
well the thing is that "time" measurements are based on actual physical phenomenon, while all the other measurements of volume, length and mass are just made up increments that used to be based on unreliable quantities of things and then eventually agreed upon as a standard use.
A day is defined as as the 360 degree rotation of the earth on it's axis. If you don't have any math system (or you believe in a geocentric universe), it's obvious to everyone that a day is the length of time between the sun's passing over the horizon.
With simple addition you can look up at the position of the sun, the moon and stars and count the time it takes them to return back to the same spot they they are in right now, which is 365 days- the time that it takes the earth to rotate around the sun- a year.
Each cycle of the moon is roughly 29.5 days, a month- with the days split up and adding on a leap day to make them all even.
Now it gets a little bit more complicated. why are there 7 days in a week? because if you divide the number of days in a month into quarters you wind up with 7. And what is the physical phenomenon that this increment is based on? None. people just made it up because they liked the idea.
So why are there 24 hours in a day? Because people incorrectly assumed that a day is equally divisible in half by daytime and nighttime (this only occurs twice a year. If you are in the northern hemisphere it will be happening in 2 days, on march 20th. Lucky you.), and they just happened to like the number 12.
As far as 60 minutes in an hour and 60 seconds in a minute, well I guess if you divide a day into quarters you get 6 hours, and if you divide 6 by 360 (the degrees of a rotating circle, which is believed to have been based on the number of days in a year) you come up with 60. No, it really doesn't make much sense either, but they stuck with it.
The point of all this is that if you tried to divide days and weeks and hours and minutes and seconds into increments of ten, it would really make things fucking complicated, and that is why even the metric system accepts these "time" measurments.
As Mongo pointed out they have since came up with precious numbers to calculate mass, volume, length, and time based on physical phenomenon (mostly derived from the speed of light in a vacuum, one of the few universal constants) This system is really the only one that makes sense to me, but these numbers are confusing to the average person.
the reason that they invented the metric system is because it's easier for people to understand than any of the other systems. if you have a number divisible by ten, what it really means to the mind is that you have a number divisible by one and then zeros, which are nothing. that is easy to work with.
if you were to multiply say, 10,000,000 (ten million) by four, you just have to add one by four and then the zeros. = 40,000,000 (forty million) easy. that's essentially one calculation point.
But if you had to multiply by a more precise, but more complex number- 9,978,316 (nine million, nine hundred and seventy eight thousand, three hundred and *******) by four- basically you'd be calculating seven times as many points in your head. Harder.
Marlo Manson
Hello Sexy girl how your Toes doing?
I vote NO but I would learn to the metric system if they decided to use both systems. :2 cents:
It is very costly to switch to metric system. Probably billions of dollars American do not have.
Just give you an example, trillions and trillions of road signs deisgnated for limit on speed have to change to 40 km, 50 km and 60 km. All the highways signs have to change to max limit 100 km/hr. which all 50 states do NOT have the money.
California is laying off state employees and cut back on services (2 fridays off for non-essential Government services), how can you justify at this time to change the system to metric.
It is much more complicated than that. All the textbooks in U.S. from kindergardens to medical schools and law schools and graduate schools have to change.
Your suger diabetics machine has to change to 5, 6, 7, 8. Do you know what it means?
Do you know your cholesterol score is 5? What is 5?
So it is nice to be in synchronics with the whole world, but it is NOT possible to do.
Leave America to be America !
Just give you an example, trillions and trillions of road signs deisgnated for limit on speed have to change to 40 km, 50 km and 60 km. All the highways signs have to change to max limit 100 km/hr. which all 50 states do NOT have the money.
California is laying off state employees and cut back on services (2 fridays off for non-essential Government services), how can you justify at this time to change the system to metric.
It is much more complicated than that. All the textbooks in U.S. from kindergardens to medical schools and law schools and graduate schools have to change.
Your suger diabetics machine has to change to 5, 6, 7, 8. Do you know what it means?
Do you know your cholesterol score is 5? What is 5?
So it is nice to be in synchronics with the whole world, but it is NOT possible to do.
Leave America to be America !
No, it does not make sense to change now.
It will cost Detroit Big Three trillions of dollars to switch the speedomters from miles per hour to kilometers per hours. It is not feasible.
I can give you millions of example it is not feasible to change.
What are you talking about? Most speedometers already have kilometers per hour printed on them, my 99 jeep does. The hardware is still the same, it's just a matter of printing different numbers on the dial.
If I hit a 7 iron from 150 yds, what club would I have to hit from 150 meters?
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