4 ms·

Why America won't go metric

4 points by TowerTall 4y ago

ggm 4y ago
The two tales here are that the US resists going metric, and a tiny core of british people try to go back to Imperial. But, I do stress its really tiny, and it focusses on "traditional" weights and measures which are in human scale. It's been exploited by the little-englander Tories as a "take back control" story but they ignore the vast preponderance now of people, citizens, voters, who grew up post metric. They know what a pound or a pint "is" but they don't particularly need duodecimal back in their lives in shops, regulated measurement spaces. Its about colloquial terms. I weigh 12 stone. I am six feet tall. I drink a pint of milk a day. My mums recipe for scones uses a quarter pound of flour. 250g of cheese just doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as half-a-pound. Really? if you want to buy half a pound of cheese, your cheese monger will cut you the correct amount, within the limits. If you NEED exactly half a pound of cheese for some unknown reason, either you have to ask them to cut 226 grams, or they have to do the sums. Or, if they still have scales capable of doing it, read from the alternate line. I knew a weights-and-measures guy, whose day job consisted of going into bars, ordering a pint, and whipping out his warrant badge and volumetric measures. he got chased out of a lot of pubs but the punters really don't like short measure, the introduction of weigh-lines on glasses or definitions like brim-full makes a difference. So there is an aspect to ordinary mensuration which people care about: the town of Culross in Fife has the old "scots" yard stapled to the wall of the tron, but they acknowledge its a different yard to the one in the village up the road. Market traders had to certify. American recipes which are in cups, can be a trial for other people, if they mix cups, oz and spoons. But then, recipes in spoons which don't stipulate full or rounded, can be a trial, and then you have volume dry or wet vs weight... I'm sure the responses here will go to NASA and rocket science, I think the US could go metric, but won't. I wouldn't say its impossible, but I see little sign of the enthusiasm needed to make the transition in everyday life. Perhaps small steps work? in 50 years you could go to dual-weight packaging, then change the size of the fonts for metric and imperial, and wind up with metric the one people use, and then deprecate imperial, but it would require inter-generational, intergovernmental alignment. The kind of fall-off-a-cliff change Britain did in the 70s and Australia in the late 60s is unlikely in the US for a range of reasons. There is low willingness to incur this kind of pain in any space in the US polity. Insufficient upsides and a voter turn-off.
- gus_massa 4y ago
  > 250g of cheese just doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as half-a-pound. 250g of cheese is just "a quarter of [a] kilo" here in Argentina. We drop the "gram" at the end.
  - ggm 4y ago
    cuarto de kilo is nice and short. Like the choripan I got at San Telmo!
- rasz 4y ago
  didnt US military already switched for the most part?
  - ggm 4y ago
    yes. I don't think they talk about 1000 metre stare but you fire a 155mm cannon and NATO standard is 7.62mm -It is arguable that NATO forced this outcome because whilst the numeric superiority is with the US forces, the heads around the table are predominantly european, and metric. I bet you there is some component of the US military supply chain which still thinks in gallons and pounds. Probably the quartermasters translate into metric equivalents, when ordering in bulk.
timcavel 4y ago
warning26 4y ago
- mikewarot 4y ago
  Fundamentally, Americans hate unnecessary and stupid change. Everything is based on metric underneath. We're used to cups, pints, etc. for recipes, etc. Our measuring cups ALSO feature milliliters (aka Cubic Centimeters). If we need metric, we've got it. Our kids will happily go along with whatever fancy new units you come up with, just let us old people have our way with our old measuring tools, etc.
londgine 4y ago
> Fox's Tucker Carlson has gone against the system I really don't like how MSM refuses to link to original sources. Here is a place that uploaded the video https://www.newsweek.com/fox-tucker-carlson-attacks-metric-system-1442485 https://www.newsweek.com/fox-tucker-carlson-attacks-metric-s...

4 points by TowerTall 4y ago

ggm 4y ago

The two tales here are that the US resists going metric, and a tiny core of british people try to go back to Imperial. But, I do stress its really tiny, and it focusses on "traditional" weights and measures which are in human scale. It's been exploited by the little-englander Tories as a "take back control" story but they ignore the vast preponderance now of people, citizens, voters, who grew up post metric. They know what a pound or a pint "is" but they don't particularly need duodecimal back in their lives in shops, regulated measurement spaces. Its about colloquial terms. I weigh 12 stone. I am six feet tall. I drink a pint of milk a day. My mums recipe for scones uses a quarter pound of flour. 250g of cheese just doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as half-a-pound. Really? if you want to buy half a pound of cheese, your cheese monger will cut you the correct amount, within the limits. If you NEED exactly half a pound of cheese for some unknown reason, either you have to ask them to cut 226 grams, or they have to do the sums. Or, if they still have scales capable of doing it, read from the alternate line. I knew a weights-and-measures guy, whose day job consisted of going into bars, ordering a pint, and whipping out his warrant badge and volumetric measures. he got chased out of a lot of pubs but the punters really don't like short measure, the introduction of weigh-lines on glasses or definitions like brim-full makes a difference. So there is an aspect to ordinary mensuration which people care about: the town of Culross in Fife has the old "scots" yard stapled to the wall of the tron, but they acknowledge its a different yard to the one in the village up the road. Market traders had to certify. American recipes which are in cups, can be a trial for other people, if they mix cups, oz and spoons. But then, recipes in spoons which don't stipulate full or rounded, can be a trial, and then you have volume dry or wet vs weight... I'm sure the responses here will go to NASA and rocket science, I think the US could go metric, but won't. I wouldn't say its impossible, but I see little sign of the enthusiasm needed to make the transition in everyday life. Perhaps small steps work? in 50 years you could go to dual-weight packaging, then change the size of the fonts for metric and imperial, and wind up with metric the one people use, and then deprecate imperial, but it would require inter-generational, intergovernmental alignment. The kind of fall-off-a-cliff change Britain did in the 70s and Australia in the late 60s is unlikely in the US for a range of reasons. There is low willingness to incur this kind of pain in any space in the US polity. Insufficient upsides and a voter turn-off.

gus_massa 4y ago
> 250g of cheese just doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as half-a-pound. 250g of cheese is just "a quarter of [a] kilo" here in Argentina. We drop the "gram" at the end.
- ggm 4y ago
  cuarto de kilo is nice and short. Like the choripan I got at San Telmo!
rasz 4y ago
didnt US military already switched for the most part?
- ggm 4y ago
  yes. I don't think they talk about 1000 metre stare but you fire a 155mm cannon and NATO standard is 7.62mm -It is arguable that NATO forced this outcome because whilst the numeric superiority is with the US forces, the heads around the table are predominantly european, and metric. I bet you there is some component of the US military supply chain which still thinks in gallons and pounds. Probably the quartermasters translate into metric equivalents, when ordering in bulk.

timcavel 4y ago

warning26 4y ago

mikewarot 4y ago
Fundamentally, Americans hate unnecessary and stupid change. Everything is based on metric underneath. We're used to cups, pints, etc. for recipes, etc. Our measuring cups ALSO feature milliliters (aka Cubic Centimeters). If we need metric, we've got it. Our kids will happily go along with whatever fancy new units you come up with, just let us old people have our way with our old measuring tools, etc.

londgine 4y ago

> Fox's Tucker Carlson has gone against the system I really don't like how MSM refuses to link to original sources. Here is a place that uploaded the video https://www.newsweek.com/fox-tucker-carlson-attacks-metric-system-1442485 https://www.newsweek.com/fox-tucker-carlson-attacks-metric-s...