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People like what they are used to, so they can be simply defending the habit. US should be pushing more strongly to switch to metric system instead of dragging
by shmerl 7y ago
People like what they are used to, so they can be simply defending the habit. US should be pushing more strongly to switch to metric system instead of dragging this for ages. Speed signs should use kilometers per hour, and weather reports should use Celsius.
- archgoon 7y agoWhy? What's the cost of doing this? What's the benefit?
- shmerl 7y agoSee the summary here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication_in_the_United_Stat... You should be long past asking about why, and should be asking why it didn't happen years ago.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- wastholm 7y agoFor one thing, as mentioned in the article, not exposing hospital patients to a completely unnecessary risk of death due to incorrect dosage of medication? When you're living inside a system, it seems perfectly normal to you, I get that. To me, when someone explains the American measurements system to me, here's what I hear: > Mr. Zabladowski: If you must know, the currency here is a little strange. First of all, in the small money comes the drakmids. At the regular, normal rate of exchange, there are 59 drakmids to one silver zlobeck. > Bart Collins: "Zlobeck"? > Mr. Zabladowski: Three silver zlobecks make one golden kratchmuk. A pastoola normally is, uh, 44,000 kratchmuks. But these, they tell me, are not normal times... (From the movie "The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T".)
- NeedMoreTea 7y agoIt's 50 years, maybe a little more, since Britain required all education to be in SI units. That's two generations taught entirely metric. Weather has been in Celsius only for almost as long. People still mostly refer to their height in feet & inches, buy a pint of beer, but petrol's in litres, they drive at 40 mph, and calculate mpg. When it's cold most people use Celsius, but when it's hot, people always remember Fahrenheit and it's 80s, 90s, etc. Never quite worked that one out. :) It's going to take a bloody long while, whenever the switch starts, whether it includes road signage or not.
- shmerl 7y agoInteresting. At least Britain pushed for it for real and as you say, even with that it takes a long time. In US it's very lax. Government basically gave up finishing the job, so it's stalled.
- NeedMoreTea 7y agoThere's other silly ones. Wood has been metric almost as long as I can remember, but 50x25mm is still commonly referred to as 2x1 etc. If it's PAR it'll be smaller than either. :) plumbing pipes and fittings are still mostly really BSP - British Standard Pipe uses inside diameter, metric outside. 15mm pipe and fitting is really a 1/2" BSP with imperial thread. UK was probably too lax about it to be honest. They didn't require all packaging to use metric only until the last 20 years, so plenty of shops kept on putting up signs in pounds even if the till worked the price in kilos. Since metric packaging was required there's been one clear downside - you're far, far more likely to have manufacturers hide price rises by dropping 5 or 10 ml or grams from a product, in an apparently identical pack. Repeat a few times and much is now randomly sized, where once all brands had comparable sizes. Choc bars, jam, used to be 1lb, 1/2, 1/4. Now some random number of g.
- shawabawa3 7y agoI've personally never heard anyone talk about temperature in farenheit
- realusername 7y ago