smorgasbord
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Fun video:
George Washington Discovers Metric
- Thread starter smorgasbord
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woodbutcherbower
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[member=77266]smorgasbord[/member] As a blue-blooded Limey, I was disappointed that the video didn't go far enough. It didn't mention;
Beer sold in pints, but wine sold in 750 millilitre bottles.
Bottled beer sold in 330 millilitre bottles. Canned beer sold in pint cans.
Whisky and other spirits sold in shots of one-sixth of a gill
3" x 2" timber sold in 2.4 metre lengths
Plasterboard and plywood sold in 2400mm x 1200mm sheets called 8 x 4's
Car economy measured in miles per gallon, using fuel bought in litres.
Car horsepower always quoted as 'PS' - an abbreviation for 'Pferdestarke' - the German version which is 0.9863 UK horsepower
Runners completing a 1500 metre race in 3 minutes 59 seconds being known as 'sub-four-minute milers'
Roads being built by the kilometer, but being signposted in miles
Fat guys weighing 25 stones or thin guys weighing 10 stones, standing on weighing scales calibrated in kilograms
I'm 6 feet 2 inches tall. My youngest daughter is 1.71 metres tall
Router bits which come in half-inch, quarter-inch, or 8 millimetre
5-pound bags of potatoes having stickers on them which say 2.27 kilos
There's way, way more.
If you can't grasp the above simple measurement ruiles, you must be really stupid [smile]
Beer sold in pints, but wine sold in 750 millilitre bottles.
Bottled beer sold in 330 millilitre bottles. Canned beer sold in pint cans.
Whisky and other spirits sold in shots of one-sixth of a gill
3" x 2" timber sold in 2.4 metre lengths
Plasterboard and plywood sold in 2400mm x 1200mm sheets called 8 x 4's
Car economy measured in miles per gallon, using fuel bought in litres.
Car horsepower always quoted as 'PS' - an abbreviation for 'Pferdestarke' - the German version which is 0.9863 UK horsepower
Runners completing a 1500 metre race in 3 minutes 59 seconds being known as 'sub-four-minute milers'
Roads being built by the kilometer, but being signposted in miles
Fat guys weighing 25 stones or thin guys weighing 10 stones, standing on weighing scales calibrated in kilograms
I'm 6 feet 2 inches tall. My youngest daughter is 1.71 metres tall
Router bits which come in half-inch, quarter-inch, or 8 millimetre
5-pound bags of potatoes having stickers on them which say 2.27 kilos
There's way, way more.
If you can't grasp the above simple measurement ruiles, you must be really stupid [smile]
Crazyraceguy
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That has to be some kind of hold-over from the old folks, that resisted the change. The same thing sort of happens here too. Many packaged items that are sold by weight or volume, are not in the traditional ounce anymore. They have been adapted to a close metric equivalent.
Back when I was just past elementary school, there was a bit of a push to go metric in everything, through the federal government. (1975?) but is was mostly voluntary, which meant everyone essentially rejected it.
Nearly 20 years later, it was mandated to every sector of the Federal government, but still didn't apply to the private sector, unless they were selling to the government.
People just reject it because it would require the adults to apply themselves and learn something. Kids could learn it easily, having no frame of reference, but then communication with the adults would be an issue. How long would it take to get that worked out? .....well the fine folks in the UK still don't know. [unsure] Many generations, obviously [big grin]
Thomas Jefferson was the one who rejected it way back in the day......because it was "too French"
Back when I was just past elementary school, there was a bit of a push to go metric in everything, through the federal government. (1975?) but is was mostly voluntary, which meant everyone essentially rejected it.
Nearly 20 years later, it was mandated to every sector of the Federal government, but still didn't apply to the private sector, unless they were selling to the government.
People just reject it because it would require the adults to apply themselves and learn something. Kids could learn it easily, having no frame of reference, but then communication with the adults would be an issue. How long would it take to get that worked out? .....well the fine folks in the UK still don't know. [unsure] Many generations, obviously [big grin]
Thomas Jefferson was the one who rejected it way back in the day......because it was "too French"
smorgasbord
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I've participated in threads on metric/imperial units before:
• The inch is now officially defined as 25.4mm. That is, the mm is the reference unit.
• France put up 16 stone meter references around Paris. There are 2 left today.
• England put up a similar reference for imperial units at the Greenwich Royal Observatory:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yard#/media/File:Imperial_Standards_of_Length,_Greenwich.jpg
Apparently, it's only reasonably accurate at 62º F
• The meter itself has gone through revisions as technology has improved:
1791: The French Academy of Sciences defined the meter as one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole, passing through Paris. This was based on measurements taken from Dunkirk to Barcelona.
1799: The meter was redefined as the distance between the polished ends of a platinum bar. This bar became known as the Meter of the Archives and was the international standard for most of the 19th century.
1889: The International Bureau of Weights and Measures established the international prototype meter as the distance between two lines on a standard bar of 90% platinum and 10% iridium.
1960: The meter was redefined as 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of the orange-red line in the spectrum of the krypton-86 atom in a vacuum.
1983: The meter was redefined as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. This definition also set the speed of light at 299,792,458 meters per second in a vacuum.
So, it's kind of too bad they couldn't start out with the meter as 1/300,000,000 of the distance light travesl in a second in a vacuum, just to have a round number based on the physical world. Or, maybe they just need to redefine the seconc?
After all, why isn't time metric? Shoudn't we have 100 seconds in a minute, 100 minutes in an hour, and 10 (OK, maybe 20) hours in a day?
And, it's really too bad the earth doesn't revolve around the sun 100 days in a year. But changing the earth's rotation around it's axis and around the sun to be some decimal variant is impossible for us humans.
My favorite part of the video was seeing that Soccer (non-American Football) uses goals that are 7.32 meters wide by 2.44 meters tall. That's weird.
Whatever you might say about the British today, they have left a mark on language and units that is not likely to go away. Heck, even the Prime Meridian goes through England, although not at the line that's on the ground anymore since we've found out the earth isn't a perfect sphere:
• The inch is now officially defined as 25.4mm. That is, the mm is the reference unit.
• France put up 16 stone meter references around Paris. There are 2 left today.
• England put up a similar reference for imperial units at the Greenwich Royal Observatory:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yard#/media/File:Imperial_Standards_of_Length,_Greenwich.jpg
Apparently, it's only reasonably accurate at 62º F
• The meter itself has gone through revisions as technology has improved:
1791: The French Academy of Sciences defined the meter as one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole, passing through Paris. This was based on measurements taken from Dunkirk to Barcelona.
1799: The meter was redefined as the distance between the polished ends of a platinum bar. This bar became known as the Meter of the Archives and was the international standard for most of the 19th century.
1889: The International Bureau of Weights and Measures established the international prototype meter as the distance between two lines on a standard bar of 90% platinum and 10% iridium.
1960: The meter was redefined as 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of the orange-red line in the spectrum of the krypton-86 atom in a vacuum.
1983: The meter was redefined as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. This definition also set the speed of light at 299,792,458 meters per second in a vacuum.
So, it's kind of too bad they couldn't start out with the meter as 1/300,000,000 of the distance light travesl in a second in a vacuum, just to have a round number based on the physical world. Or, maybe they just need to redefine the seconc?
After all, why isn't time metric? Shoudn't we have 100 seconds in a minute, 100 minutes in an hour, and 10 (OK, maybe 20) hours in a day?
And, it's really too bad the earth doesn't revolve around the sun 100 days in a year. But changing the earth's rotation around it's axis and around the sun to be some decimal variant is impossible for us humans.
My favorite part of the video was seeing that Soccer (non-American Football) uses goals that are 7.32 meters wide by 2.44 meters tall. That's weird.
Whatever you might say about the British today, they have left a mark on language and units that is not likely to go away. Heck, even the Prime Meridian goes through England, although not at the line that's on the ground anymore since we've found out the earth isn't a perfect sphere:
Crazyraceguy said:
Australia does not seem to have those problems apart from a few of us old fogies but I converted back in the late 1970's. My wife is a classic example, whose interests and professional life is based around textiles, quilting, designing clothes etc and that is largely driven from a US base so she has never converted to metric. I have been renovating her sewing room and trying to talk about measurement and dimensions with her is frustrating to say the least. There is no mixing of metric/imperial as in the UK but I believe Canada may have that issue. On a small scale it may exist but in the wider community it doesn't.
woodbutcherbower
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smorgasbord said:
You mean 16.667° Celsius ?
smorgasbord
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woodbutcherbower said:
No, 289.817º Kelvin. [cool]
Crazyraceguy
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smorgasbord said:
It's not really as "weird" as it looks. Yes, those are seemingly non-sensical decimal measurements (why wouldn't they be 7.5m x 2.5m?) but they are really just conversions of that pesky American system. they equate to 24 feet x 8 feet. So, they weren't originally designed with metric measurements.
Cheese
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Crazyraceguy said:
So, the soccer association chose to go the metric route on the size of the pitch, the diameter, weight and even the inflation pressure of the ball but then decided to switch over and use the pesky American system to size the goal posts?...now that is weird.
squall_line
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I finally watched the entire thing.
I initially thought it was just someone re-posting the bit as their own, but then I heard the original dialogue. As a big fan of the original (and a slightly lesser fan of the followup), that was pretty brilliantly done!
I initially thought it was just someone re-posting the bit as their own, but then I heard the original dialogue. As a big fan of the original (and a slightly lesser fan of the followup), that was pretty brilliantly done!
Crazyraceguy
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Mini Me said:
Point taken.... [unsure] but back then the length of a foot changed with the current king, the practice of which even went back to Egyptian times.
The American system may be dumb, but it is consistent............. :
