2 ms·

It does not bother me, it turns out that having an inconsistent measuring system is not actually that bad. and metric, it turns out has no more purity in it's b

by somat 4y ago

It does not bother me, it turns out that having an inconsistent measuring system is not actually that bad. and metric, it turns out has no more purity in it's base units than any other system. Take the meter, the group setting up the metric system was searching hard for something that was close in size to a yard so they choose 1/10_000_000 the distance from the pole to the equator. nothing wrong with that, but it is not really better than any other arbitrary unit, and with the better defined ways to calculate it(now defined as 1/299792458 of a light second), just as random. Or celsius, base it on 100 units between the freezing and boiling points of water, not a terrible thing to use, however with the later discovery of absolute zero, they needed a scale that used that, but did not try to redefine the measurement system to include absolute zero, so now you now have this really awkward 273.15... degree difference between the two scales, the nice scale that starts at zero has no other auspicious points to calibrate it at, and the scale with nice points does not start at zero. they could have made their new scale 100 degrees between zero and the freezing point of water, but that would have re jiggered every other derived unit, so understandable that they did not. Personally I think an si system set up around base twelve would kick ass, what would make it even better would be to replace our base ten number system with a base twelve one, 10 is kind of a poor number in terms of fractions possible. 2 is fine but nobody wants to use 5, things just get awkward when you use 5. nether one is ever going to happen but it is fun to think about our assumptions when it comes to counting and measurement.

perilunar 4y ago
> metric, it turns out has no more purity in it's base units than any other system. The base units are still somewhat arbitrary, in that they are based on this planet: the meter is related to the gradian and the circumference of the Earth. Celsius is based on the freezing and boiling point of water in our atmosphere. Mass is based on a specific volume water. If we were to set up a system now we could base it on fundamental physical constants (e.g planck or atomic units). But then we would have the same problem that the US currently has: endless arguments about how the old system is so much more 'natural' and convenient than the new one. The fact is that the rest of the world has gone metric, and the US will too, eventually. But SI has 2 things that the Imperial and US Customary systems do not have: 1. It is coherent: the base units and the derived units relate to each other simply without arbitrary conversion factors. With Imperial and US units you can't even convert between length, area, and volume without them. 2. It is based on powers of 10. There is only one unit for each quantity, and a single system of common multipliers. > Personally I think an si system set up around base twelve would kick ass If we had 12 fingers and used base 12 in everyday life, then a measurement system based on multiples of 12 would be awesome. Base 12 is much better than base 10. But we don't.
Fatnino 4y ago
Step 1: get humans to evolve an extra thumb on each hand Step 2: ??? Step 3: profit
- somat 4y ago
  if you have to count on your fingers just use your thumb to mark each finger bone. 4 fingers 3 bones each, there is twelve right there. now use your other hand the same way as the 10's(12 in base 10) digit. now you can count to 100(144 in base 10) on your fingers. see, much better than base a Babylonian sheepherders did something similar but 12 on one hand and 5 on the other to end up with 60, which is why you see twelve and 60 show up in time measurement.

by somat 4y ago

perilunar 4y ago

> metric, it turns out has no more purity in it's base units than any other system. The base units are still somewhat arbitrary, in that they are based on this planet: the meter is related to the gradian and the circumference of the Earth. Celsius is based on the freezing and boiling point of water in our atmosphere. Mass is based on a specific volume water. If we were to set up a system now we could base it on fundamental physical constants (e.g planck or atomic units). But then we would have the same problem that the US currently has: endless arguments about how the old system is so much more 'natural' and convenient than the new one. The fact is that the rest of the world has gone metric, and the US will too, eventually. But SI has 2 things that the Imperial and US Customary systems do not have: 1. It is coherent: the base units and the derived units relate to each other simply without arbitrary conversion factors. With Imperial and US units you can't even convert between length, area, and volume without them. 2. It is based on powers of 10. There is only one unit for each quantity, and a single system of common multipliers. > Personally I think an si system set up around base twelve would kick ass If we had 12 fingers and used base 12 in everyday life, then a measurement system based on multiples of 12 would be awesome. Base 12 is much better than base 10. But we don't.

Fatnino 4y ago

Step 1: get humans to evolve an extra thumb on each hand Step 2: ??? Step 3: profit

somat 4y ago
if you have to count on your fingers just use your thumb to mark each finger bone. 4 fingers 3 bones each, there is twelve right there. now use your other hand the same way as the 10's(12 in base 10) digit. now you can count to 100(144 in base 10) on your fingers. see, much better than base a Babylonian sheepherders did something similar but 12 on one hand and 5 on the other to end up with 60, which is why you see twelve and 60 show up in time measurement.