6 ms·
I'm European and think in horsepower, not kW. Because I was born 40+ yrs ago. So what? It's basically just a linear conversion of kw = .75 x hp anyway. What's t
by ulfw 5y ago
I'm European and think in horsepower, not kW. Because I was born 40+ yrs ago. So what?
It's basically just a linear conversion of kw = .75 x hp anyway. What's the huge advantage here?
I'm all for metric or SI. But let's not overstate the value please.
- inter_netuser 5y agomost of the value is in having a uniform and consistent system of units. It is the mixture of both that ends up being very confusing.
- rgj 5y agoI was born 48 years ago. The advantage is not having to remember all those funny constants and being able to do math in your head that actually makes sense? Or more important, to be able to write an article that the entire planet can just read without 95% of them (everybody outside the US, UK and Myanmar) having to resort to Google to find out if those numbers are impressive or not?
- shpx 5y agoadd Canada and you've named like a fifth or a quarter of all English speakers
- rgj 5y agoGood addition / correction. So the amount of people that is unable to follow the article without too much effort went down from 95% to 80% of the audience.
- pietherr 5y agoFunny how all these proponents of SI units state their age in years instead of seconds :)
- Kbelicius 5y agoIt isn't funny because the GP doesn't want SI units to be used because they are a standard but because 95% of the world can understand them. I'm certain that more than 95% of people understand years.
- wackro 5y agoAnd some will never understand humour either
- Kbelicius 5y agoThis sounds like it is directed at me and I don't see why. Humor is often dependent on context. Some jokes are funny in some situations and not in others. The above joke is not funny here since it entirely misses the context in which it should be used.
- jtc331 5y agoHumor also often has a lot of contextual flex, which is intentional misinterpretation (e.g., unintentional double meaning) is often humorous. Just laugh at the joke.
- ragebol 5y agoPhsh, I know a guy that celebrated turning a billion seconds old. Brought pie and everything
- cromka 5y agoI think the point was that horsepower is widely understandable and preferred in Europe as a unit of an engine power, despite otherwise using the SI units.
- chronogram 5y agoHorsepower is different though, you have imperial horsepower and metric horsepower (and many more). Both are not the same and neither is a round 750 watts. For the last years I’ve mostly seen watts being used in NL, but it’s been ages since I saw a fast and furious movie or a top gear show. The car sellers use kW and often also, I assume metric, horsepower.
- _0ffh 5y ago>The advantage is not having to remember all those funny constants This, very much! I've done a ton of physical simulation code in my life. Whenever some newb or student comes to me for the first time with their simulation code that mysteriously doesn't work, in 90% of cases they stupidly didn't stick to SI and forked up some unit conversion, or mutiple. I tell the to keep it in SI and never let me see them make that mistake again. (Only exception is simple 1-to-1 unit conversions of parameters and results, when some stupid interface definition demands it that can't easily be changed.)
- cblconfederate 5y agoI don't have a mental model for "64 pounds". Apparently, it s the weight of a 9 year old, which would ve been a better unit of measure.
- hgomersall 5y agoThe value is twofold: 1. Everything uses a common base, so you don't get a base change on a scale change (or indeed, two different bases for different parts of the same measurement), and dimensional consistency becomes trivial. 2. The base is base-10, which is the same as our common counting system.
- jtc331 5y agoThere are two exceptions I’m aware of to “SI is easier in practice”. 1. Temperature. It’s useful to elongate units over the range normally experienced by humans, which Fahrenheit does and Celsius does not, because it avoids tenths of a degree, for example, in room temperature selection. 2. Woodworking and similar: it’s useful to use powers of two because it’s very common to be marking/cutting/etc. 1/2 or 2x a value, which is easier to do in inverse power of two English measurements.
- hgomersall 5y agoCelsius isn't SI, though I can appreciate there are reasons for particular units in particular circumstances.
- M2Ys4U 5y agoOne degree Celsius is exactly the same as one Kelvin, though.
- 83 5y agoI've found metric to be better for woodworking, and especially metalworking. Powers of two (imperial) are no easier than doubling a metric measurement, and more difficult when partitioning items items in thirds or fourths, or having to cut wood in half with lengths like 56 and 7/32 inches (1428mm).
- yourusername 5y agoHorsepower is not horsepower. American "HP" is not the same as the horsepower (PS, pferdestärke) we use in Europe when we talk about "horsepower". a kW is always 1000 watt, not 992.3 watts because of course it's a Canadian kW.
- d12bb 5y agoSo you’re telling me I can’t even trust SI unit abbreviations when coming from beyond the pond? That a kW in America isn’t 1000 W as it should be? F*ck :D
- fragmede 5y agoYou think that's bad, try talking to computer people. They think a kilo of their bits means 1024 of them, not 1000!
- d12bb 5y agoI like! Wish we could all start understanding the difference between kilo and kibi, mega and mebu and so on for bits and bytes.
- extropy 5y agoKilo is always 1000. Kibi is 1024. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_prefix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_prefix
- flohofwoe 5y agoI know the 'kibibytes' thing but never encountered it in a real-world context (e.g. like "the C64 had 64 kibibytes of RAM").
- Kubuxu 5y agoI personally decided to just use them always for clarity and I saw few people around me catch on. Be the change you want to see, especially when it comes to the free minor stuff.
- alkonaut 5y agoSame. Screens and wheels are still 100% described in inches in sales. Cars are specified with HP and optionally kW. Never kW alone. Outside of these weird exceptions, it's SI all the way. And this doesn't really vary with age. The web site whrere you buy wheels and TVs doesn't know your age so it will say the rims or screens are 20" regardless of who you are.
- Swenrekcah 5y agoNow with electric cars we have battery capacity specified in kWh, vehicle power in kW and charging capability in kW. This is all as it should, however a large number of people have a really hard time groking the difference between kW and kWh. So much so that I wonder if we should start specifying battery capacity in MJ to help people clarify things in their heads.
- searedsteak 5y agoI've noticed that some EV users talk about charging rates in "kWh/h". Which is interesting, to say the least.
- Workaccount2 5y agoSomeone needs to teach them algebra
- elsjaako 5y agoCalories, grit, carats (for diamonds), Beaufort, viscocity is of ten boven in cP, grit (based on inches), dernier, rpm, dpi, lightyears, and of course km/hr. Plenty of non-SI units in use
- alkonaut 5y agoYes. I meant metric and sloppily said "SI" despite most common metric units only occasionally being SI. Beaufort is a dimensionless label as far as I'm aware and grit is used as such too (i.e. it never says anything else than "240" i.e. it doesn't "240 grit" or "240 something per inch").