8 ms·

"Back when I was a Catholic-school kid in northern Wisconsin, my school lessons briefly focused on the metric system. This was in the late 1970s." Man, the pro

"Back when I was a Catholic-school kid in northern Wisconsin, my school lessons briefly focused on the metric system. This was in the late 1970s." Man, the progressive school (Comanche Elementary in Overland Park, Kansas!) must have had a huge impact on my life. In addition to open classrooms (I was in Unit 5, not 4th Grade), team teaching, a focus on experimental science, a circular layout to the school with a sunken (architecturally) library in the center… Yeah, we went over the Metric System that whole year. I can still sing the "Metric Family" song from the film on metric units ("Kilo", "Milli", etc.). And to my young and impressionable mind, the U.S. was joining the rest of the "Free World" in a kind of Star-Trek-like casting aside of the old things that divided us—joining each other with a focus on progress, science, space… President Carter came along around the same time or shortly after. And I have a photo of a family road trip to South Dakota, Montana: the sign that indicates the altitude of a particular mountain pass has both feet and meters. I Google-mapped the same location recently and of course it's no longer in meters. I feel like in my elementary school days (the 1970's) the U.S. was on the cusp of a future of optimism—no doubt buoyed by having put astronauts on the Moon, but I was wildly on board for it. But then some kind of shit seemingly started to poison the country. I don't feel we have ever returned to that level of national optimism. Perhaps 1976, the Bicentennial, was the end of it. (Recently watching the film "Nashville" brought me back a bit of the vibe of the times.) I've been missing it my entire life since.

ericmay 10mo ago
> Yeah, we went over the Metric System that whole year. I can still sing the "Metric Family" song from the film on metric units ("Kilo", "Milli", etc.). And to my young an impressionable mind, the U.S. was joining the rest of the world "Free World" in a kind of Star-Trek-like casting aside of the old things that divided us—joining each other with a focus on progress, science, space… I’ve always found this peculiar because at times I have felt the same, but reflecting over the years and I guess as my mind settling on lived experience and opinions I’ve come to appreciate the Imperial system far more precisely because of its absurdities but also because of its history and usefulness without instrument. As someone who, well, finds say Renaissance or Impressionist art to so far be the peak of human artistry, I find the imperial system fits in better with that warmth of humanity in contrast to Frank Lloyd Wright, Banksy, minimalism, and the cold calculation of the more “scientific” metric system. Underneath that all is also this view that the United States at least needs to “join the world” and adopt Metric, and soccer, and such and I find myself increasingly rejecting both and other similar notions in favor of cultural uniqueness and fun over conformity. I hope we never change sustems, and I don’t think we will anytime soon. If we do, however, we should not switch to Celsius because the useful scale of Fahrenheit is far superior 0-100 versus 0-32. Celsius isn’t very Metric-y.
- shoxidizer 10mo ago
  Frank Llyod Wright lacking warmth and humanity? Never been to Falling Water?
  - ericmay 10mo ago
    I’ve never been but the photos I’ve seen I would describe as lacking warmth and humanity. Maybe my opinion would change seeing it in person. I’m open to that. But the other issue with that property specifically is that it seems to be that it is built out of fear of humanity and that’s why elements of the property (again from photos) look like what you’d see in a bunker or if you were trying to hide. It lacks symmetry as well which introduces fear. You can think of it as how one might feel looking at a painting of Dance in the Country by Renoir and Guernica by Picasso. If you find the former to be near perfection, full of vibrancy, warmth, and love you may as I do find Picasso’s work to be chaotic, disheveled, asymmetric, or even psychotic.
    - relaxing 10mo ago
      You think Frank Lloyd Wright designed big picture windows and open floor plans because he was afraid of humanity? He was afraid so he tried to induce fear? Through asymmetry? What then of William Blake’s “fearful symmetry”? Amazing that FLW is still traumatizing conservatives 100 years later. Ayn Rand was a fan, didn’t you know? Picasso was trying to convey the feeling of being bombed from the sky in a civil war, so at least your reading there is accurate.
      - ericmay 10mo ago
        > You think Frank Lloyd Wright designed big picture windows and open floor plans because he was afraid of humanity? He was afraid so he tried to induce fear? No, I was speaking about the exterior. The blending in of the surroundings, and hiding of things like the entrance are the hallmark of post-war architectural trends. Not that I'm claiming Lloyd suffered from the same PTSD that returning American veterans did, but his building follows some of the same patterns. For example, here: where's the door? http://www.wright-house.com/frank-lloyd-wright/fallingwater-pictures/large-fallingwater-photos/high-resolution/7x-front-door-east-end-L.jpg http://www.wright-house.com/frank-lloyd-wright/fallingwater-... But moving to the widows, even from that photo you can see how while the interior gives the occupants a nice view, the exterior hides them - sort of like a bunker. > Through asymmetry? What then of William Blake’s “fearful symmetry”? Idk, can you elaborate? We know as a matter of scientific study that asymmetry in architectural design introduces stress, let me know if you'd like a source in case you are curious. > Amazing that FLW is still traumatizing conservatives 100 years later. Ayn Rand was a fan, didn’t you know? I don't understand this comment. Why would I care what Ayn Rand thinks or thought? > Picasso was trying to convey the feeling of being bombed from the sky in a civil war, so at least your reading there is accurate. Sure. But in that interpretation I find cold, calculating, death, and fear. None of which I find particularly attractive in art. And Picasso in these years is probably the best "good" example of this style of art. Afterwards it gets more and more psychotic to the point where you've got the whole banana taped to a wall for $6 million. Western artists have forgotten what art is and what the purpose of it is, in my opinion.
master_crab 10mo ago
It was there again in the 90s after the wall fell. Fukuyama was boldly proclaiming the “end of history.” Newt started to kick at the edges with his combative policies but the inertia continued until the dotcom crash and 9/11 came along, and fully ended with the Great Recession.* * (From my viewpoint as a millennial. Gen Z might think the golden years were during Obama, or just pre-COVID. To some extent every generation has a point in time that they see with rose tinted lenses.)
- anonymars 10mo ago
  The Daily Show did a segment on this. I can't find the clip but the title was "Even Better Than the Real Thing" and it was with John Oliver. Anyway the conclusion was "the good old days when life was simpler" are inevitably "when you were a child" -- it would be interesting to see how that holds up with others
- antisthenes 10mo ago
  > (From my viewpoint as a millennial. Gen Z might think the golden years were during Obama, or just pre-COVID. To some extent every generation has a point in time that they see with rose tinted lenses.) Of course they do. It's the formative years & youth. Roughly from the time you form a mature consciousness (12-14 yo) to roughly your late 20s or maybe early 30s when all your tastes, preferences etc. are formed.
  - master_crab 10mo ago
    Oh that is definitely part of it. But new generations also don’t have a point of reference. I certainly don’t know if the 70s or the 80s were truly that great. Outside economic and social indicators (income, life expectancy — all of which should arguably carry more weight anywa) it’s difficult to argue against something if you never experienced it.
    - direwolf20 10mo ago
      [dead]
    - 10mo ago
MisterTea 10mo ago
> I've been missing it my entire life since. Childhood Zeitgeist is a perfect term for this. We all pine for it.
FeloniousHam 10mo ago
I understand existing-tool-holder opposition to a new measurement system, but sweet mother I hate fraction math.
- mindslight 10mo ago
  I keep trying to make myself think in terms of 32nds. For example think of a 9/16 wrench as "18", the 1/2 wrench is just "16", and so on. It's a slow process. I want to standardize on some color code for easy cross-brand identification of wrench sizes too, but I haven't come up with a compelling scheme. The worst is the hardware. I inherited a full assortment of #2-#10 stainless SAE UNC hardware from a business move (already in nice parts drawers, too). It was pretty awesome for just having whatever I needed on hand to build things. But now as I maintain more and more things that are metric native, I've been building up the assortment of metric threads as well. I suspect this is one of the real pain points of fabricators (plus taps/dies). And I'm guessing they're still still Imperial native due to existing tooling, making the conversions not clean (it's easy to convert 1/2 inch to 12.7mm and measure that, but it's not straightforward to convert 10mm to 0.3937 inches (25.2/64ths) and measure that.
- AngryData 10mo ago
  Im the other way around and think fractional math isn't used enough because it is so easy and useful. I think fractional maths biggest obstacle is everyone trying to avoid it and not learning it in contexts and methods where it excels. That said, I still use tons of decimal math because sometimes it is more useful, but not always.
- yencabulator 9mo ago
  Even the existing-tool-holder is a weak excuse. My socket wrench set came with two near-identical sequences of wrenches, metric and imperial. I regularly the encounter metric variants in the US. Switching to metric, like the rest of the world, would make things simpler.
jhoechtl 10mo ago
I think it was Reagan turning all backwards orientated
wffurr 10mo ago
>> But then [post-1970s] some kind of shit seemingly started to poison the country. https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ - the oil ran out and the post-war boom ended.
- nine_k 10mo ago
  You mean, cheap oil ran out. Also, the last remaining sort-of-gold-standard was abolished, so the money printer could go brrr without much restrain, as needed.
- JKCalhoun 10mo ago
  If you think being tethered to gold was a good thing I wonder if you also believe wealth is a zero-sum proposal? I would think that the explosive growth of wealth since 1971 would cause most to rethink that.
  - wffurr 10mo ago
    >> If you think being tethered to gold was a good thing I wouldn't say that. But the memes about 1971 are striking. >> I wonder if you also believe wealth is a zero-sum proposal I don't know where that comes from. Pretty clearly it's not. Building stuff that multiplies labor productivity produces more wealth for everyone. I think the issue in 1971 wasn't the end of the gold standard per se, but the end of the post-war reconstruction boom, the end of cheap oil subsidizing literally everything, and what I didn't mention in my original comment but it also highly relevant is the drastic lowering of top tax rates. Wealth isn't zero-sum, but dividing up the share of the newly created wealth is. The more of it that goes to capital instead of labor, the more of that share of productivity growth is captured by the rich instead of the workers, who end up not sharing in the broader prosperity of society.
ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago
>no doubt buoyed by having put astronauts on the Moon NASA did this using customary units >I've been missing it my entire life since Surely you've learned by now that you're missing childhood, not an actual thing about the US? I'm asking this as someone who does think this era was peak Americana, but for totally different reasons than you present, and having not been alive then myself.
- pezezin 9mo ago
  > NASA did this using customary units The Apollo Guidance Computer performed all internal calculations in SI units, and only converted to US customary units for display: https://ukma.org.uk/why-metric/myths/metric-internationally/the-moon-landings/ https://ukma.org.uk/why-metric/myths/metric-internationally/...
  - ahmeneeroe-v2 9mo ago
    yes, I know and surely you understand that the on-board computer was just one part of many in a years-long program that got men onto the moon
quesera 10mo ago
The US Metric Board was cancelled in 1982 by one Ronald Wilson Reagan (anagram: Insane Anglo Warlord). RWR and the charismatic traditionalism he espoused have caused a great deal of harm to American society. Metrication is not at the top of that list, but it is one of many examples that we still live with today.
mturmon 10mo ago
Katherine Carpenter Elementary, OP, KS for me, in the same era -- just a couple miles from your school. I share some of the same disappointment, especially going back and noticing disinvestment in the schools, which were one of the gems of the area.
- JKCalhoun 10mo ago
  Shawnee Mission was a gem of the Midwest. I was told that only California had better schools (whosaidthat?). (And then of course Prop 13 came along and impaled California.)
  - mturmon 10mo ago
    My son went to LA-area and LAUSD schools, and the echo of that same commitment from those years in California was still faintly detectable in the 2010s, highly attenuated by Prop 13, as you mention.

ericmay 10mo ago

> Yeah, we went over the Metric System that whole year. I can still sing the "Metric Family" song from the film on metric units ("Kilo", "Milli", etc.). And to my young an impressionable mind, the U.S. was joining the rest of the world "Free World" in a kind of Star-Trek-like casting aside of the old things that divided us—joining each other with a focus on progress, science, space… I’ve always found this peculiar because at times I have felt the same, but reflecting over the years and I guess as my mind settling on lived experience and opinions I’ve come to appreciate the Imperial system far more precisely because of its absurdities but also because of its history and usefulness without instrument. As someone who, well, finds say Renaissance or Impressionist art to so far be the peak of human artistry, I find the imperial system fits in better with that warmth of humanity in contrast to Frank Lloyd Wright, Banksy, minimalism, and the cold calculation of the more “scientific” metric system. Underneath that all is also this view that the United States at least needs to “join the world” and adopt Metric, and soccer, and such and I find myself increasingly rejecting both and other similar notions in favor of cultural uniqueness and fun over conformity. I hope we never change sustems, and I don’t think we will anytime soon. If we do, however, we should not switch to Celsius because the useful scale of Fahrenheit is far superior 0-100 versus 0-32. Celsius isn’t very Metric-y.

shoxidizer 10mo ago
Frank Llyod Wright lacking warmth and humanity? Never been to Falling Water?
- ericmay 10mo ago
  I’ve never been but the photos I’ve seen I would describe as lacking warmth and humanity. Maybe my opinion would change seeing it in person. I’m open to that. But the other issue with that property specifically is that it seems to be that it is built out of fear of humanity and that’s why elements of the property (again from photos) look like what you’d see in a bunker or if you were trying to hide. It lacks symmetry as well which introduces fear. You can think of it as how one might feel looking at a painting of Dance in the Country by Renoir and Guernica by Picasso. If you find the former to be near perfection, full of vibrancy, warmth, and love you may as I do find Picasso’s work to be chaotic, disheveled, asymmetric, or even psychotic.
  - relaxing 10mo ago
    You think Frank Lloyd Wright designed big picture windows and open floor plans because he was afraid of humanity? He was afraid so he tried to induce fear? Through asymmetry? What then of William Blake’s “fearful symmetry”? Amazing that FLW is still traumatizing conservatives 100 years later. Ayn Rand was a fan, didn’t you know? Picasso was trying to convey the feeling of being bombed from the sky in a civil war, so at least your reading there is accurate.
    - ericmay 10mo ago
      > You think Frank Lloyd Wright designed big picture windows and open floor plans because he was afraid of humanity? He was afraid so he tried to induce fear? No, I was speaking about the exterior. The blending in of the surroundings, and hiding of things like the entrance are the hallmark of post-war architectural trends. Not that I'm claiming Lloyd suffered from the same PTSD that returning American veterans did, but his building follows some of the same patterns. For example, here: where's the door? http://www.wright-house.com/frank-lloyd-wright/fallingwater-pictures/large-fallingwater-photos/high-resolution/7x-front-door-east-end-L.jpg http://www.wright-house.com/frank-lloyd-wright/fallingwater-... But moving to the widows, even from that photo you can see how while the interior gives the occupants a nice view, the exterior hides them - sort of like a bunker. > Through asymmetry? What then of William Blake’s “fearful symmetry”? Idk, can you elaborate? We know as a matter of scientific study that asymmetry in architectural design introduces stress, let me know if you'd like a source in case you are curious. > Amazing that FLW is still traumatizing conservatives 100 years later. Ayn Rand was a fan, didn’t you know? I don't understand this comment. Why would I care what Ayn Rand thinks or thought? > Picasso was trying to convey the feeling of being bombed from the sky in a civil war, so at least your reading there is accurate. Sure. But in that interpretation I find cold, calculating, death, and fear. None of which I find particularly attractive in art. And Picasso in these years is probably the best "good" example of this style of art. Afterwards it gets more and more psychotic to the point where you've got the whole banana taped to a wall for $6 million. Western artists have forgotten what art is and what the purpose of it is, in my opinion.

master_crab 10mo ago

It was there again in the 90s after the wall fell. Fukuyama was boldly proclaiming the “end of history.” Newt started to kick at the edges with his combative policies but the inertia continued until the dotcom crash and 9/11 came along, and fully ended with the Great Recession.* * (From my viewpoint as a millennial. Gen Z might think the golden years were during Obama, or just pre-COVID. To some extent every generation has a point in time that they see with rose tinted lenses.)

anonymars 10mo ago
The Daily Show did a segment on this. I can't find the clip but the title was "Even Better Than the Real Thing" and it was with John Oliver. Anyway the conclusion was "the good old days when life was simpler" are inevitably "when you were a child" -- it would be interesting to see how that holds up with others
antisthenes 10mo ago
> (From my viewpoint as a millennial. Gen Z might think the golden years were during Obama, or just pre-COVID. To some extent every generation has a point in time that they see with rose tinted lenses.) Of course they do. It's the formative years & youth. Roughly from the time you form a mature consciousness (12-14 yo) to roughly your late 20s or maybe early 30s when all your tastes, preferences etc. are formed.
- master_crab 10mo ago
  Oh that is definitely part of it. But new generations also don’t have a point of reference. I certainly don’t know if the 70s or the 80s were truly that great. Outside economic and social indicators (income, life expectancy — all of which should arguably carry more weight anywa) it’s difficult to argue against something if you never experienced it.
  - direwolf20 10mo ago
    [dead]
  - 10mo ago

MisterTea 10mo ago

> I've been missing it my entire life since. Childhood Zeitgeist is a perfect term for this. We all pine for it.

FeloniousHam 10mo ago

I understand existing-tool-holder opposition to a new measurement system, but sweet mother I hate fraction math.

mindslight 10mo ago
I keep trying to make myself think in terms of 32nds. For example think of a 9/16 wrench as "18", the 1/2 wrench is just "16", and so on. It's a slow process. I want to standardize on some color code for easy cross-brand identification of wrench sizes too, but I haven't come up with a compelling scheme. The worst is the hardware. I inherited a full assortment of #2-#10 stainless SAE UNC hardware from a business move (already in nice parts drawers, too). It was pretty awesome for just having whatever I needed on hand to build things. But now as I maintain more and more things that are metric native, I've been building up the assortment of metric threads as well. I suspect this is one of the real pain points of fabricators (plus taps/dies). And I'm guessing they're still still Imperial native due to existing tooling, making the conversions not clean (it's easy to convert 1/2 inch to 12.7mm and measure that, but it's not straightforward to convert 10mm to 0.3937 inches (25.2/64ths) and measure that.
AngryData 10mo ago
Im the other way around and think fractional math isn't used enough because it is so easy and useful. I think fractional maths biggest obstacle is everyone trying to avoid it and not learning it in contexts and methods where it excels. That said, I still use tons of decimal math because sometimes it is more useful, but not always.
yencabulator 9mo ago
Even the existing-tool-holder is a weak excuse. My socket wrench set came with two near-identical sequences of wrenches, metric and imperial. I regularly the encounter metric variants in the US. Switching to metric, like the rest of the world, would make things simpler.

jhoechtl 10mo ago

I think it was Reagan turning all backwards orientated

wffurr 10mo ago

>> But then [post-1970s] some kind of shit seemingly started to poison the country. https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ - the oil ran out and the post-war boom ended.

nine_k 10mo ago
You mean, cheap oil ran out. Also, the last remaining sort-of-gold-standard was abolished, so the money printer could go brrr without much restrain, as needed.
JKCalhoun 10mo ago
If you think being tethered to gold was a good thing I wonder if you also believe wealth is a zero-sum proposal? I would think that the explosive growth of wealth since 1971 would cause most to rethink that.
- wffurr 10mo ago
  >> If you think being tethered to gold was a good thing I wouldn't say that. But the memes about 1971 are striking. >> I wonder if you also believe wealth is a zero-sum proposal I don't know where that comes from. Pretty clearly it's not. Building stuff that multiplies labor productivity produces more wealth for everyone. I think the issue in 1971 wasn't the end of the gold standard per se, but the end of the post-war reconstruction boom, the end of cheap oil subsidizing literally everything, and what I didn't mention in my original comment but it also highly relevant is the drastic lowering of top tax rates. Wealth isn't zero-sum, but dividing up the share of the newly created wealth is. The more of it that goes to capital instead of labor, the more of that share of productivity growth is captured by the rich instead of the workers, who end up not sharing in the broader prosperity of society.

ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago

>no doubt buoyed by having put astronauts on the Moon NASA did this using customary units >I've been missing it my entire life since Surely you've learned by now that you're missing childhood, not an actual thing about the US? I'm asking this as someone who does think this era was peak Americana, but for totally different reasons than you present, and having not been alive then myself.

pezezin 9mo ago
> NASA did this using customary units The Apollo Guidance Computer performed all internal calculations in SI units, and only converted to US customary units for display: https://ukma.org.uk/why-metric/myths/metric-internationally/the-moon-landings/ https://ukma.org.uk/why-metric/myths/metric-internationally/...
- ahmeneeroe-v2 9mo ago
  yes, I know and surely you understand that the on-board computer was just one part of many in a years-long program that got men onto the moon

quesera 10mo ago

The US Metric Board was cancelled in 1982 by one Ronald Wilson Reagan (anagram: Insane Anglo Warlord). RWR and the charismatic traditionalism he espoused have caused a great deal of harm to American society. Metrication is not at the top of that list, but it is one of many examples that we still live with today.

mturmon 10mo ago

Katherine Carpenter Elementary, OP, KS for me, in the same era -- just a couple miles from your school. I share some of the same disappointment, especially going back and noticing disinvestment in the schools, which were one of the gems of the area.

JKCalhoun 10mo ago
Shawnee Mission was a gem of the Midwest. I was told that only California had better schools (whosaidthat?). (And then of course Prop 13 came along and impaled California.)
- mturmon 10mo ago
  My son went to LA-area and LAUSD schools, and the echo of that same commitment from those years in California was still faintly detectable in the 2010s, highly attenuated by Prop 13, as you mention.