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I rarely see anyone consider that the American system has at least one fundamental advantage: it's closer to a binary system, rather than decimal. Why do we wa

I rarely see anyone consider that the American system has at least one fundamental advantage: it's closer to a binary system, rather than decimal. Why do we want a decimal system? The only reason for a base of 10 that I can see is that we have ten fingers. But binary systems map better to a lot of real-world problems. If baking, are you more likely to take a recipe and halve it or cut it by a factor of ten? In construction, are you more likely to subdivide an area into two, or ten? If you split a stock, are you more likely to split two-to-one or ten-to-one? The answer, in all those cases, is the former, which is favored by a binary system. Forcing decimal upon us is what leaves us with numbers like 0.125 rather than 1/8. So rather than move to metric, let's come up with a more consistent base-two system, and then we can all use that. (Just saying that to make a point; not a serious proposal.)

rdtsc 12y ago
> it's closer to a binary system, rather than decimal. Not sure I follow. We got : 1 yard = 3 feet = 36 inches how is that closer to binary, than say: 1m = 10dm = 100cm = 1000mm
- spc476 12y ago
  It's close, but not quite. 2 cups to 1 pint. 2 pints to one quart. 2 quarts to 1 gallon. But then there are the odd ones, like 3 feet to 1 yard, 3 teaspoons to 1 tablespoon (2 tablespoons is 1 dessertspoon though). But there is quite a bit of doubling in the Imperial system.
bnj 12y ago
I don't understand. It's just as easy to divide by half in a decimal system as in a binary system; both share 2 as a factor. My mathematician friends tell me that for a lot of reasons base twelve (like our clock) would be preferable, but changing makes no sense because the benefits don't come close to the costs... In any event, like and system of measurement, decimal is ultimately founded on some arbitrary decisions. The argument in favor of decimal is that a common system of measurement has incredible advantages; nothing you mentioned in favor of the imperial system stands up to the benefits to being in lockstep with the rest of civilization.
D_Alex 12y ago
>If baking, are you more likely to take a recipe and halve it or cut it by a factor of ten? You are more likely to halve it. How does the "American" system help, if you have to halve say 1 lb of butter and 1 quart of milk? It just means you need to retain in your head a bunch of definitions and inconsistent conversion factors.
- spc476 12y ago
  Well, half a pound of butter is two sticks (butter here is typically sold in four-stick packages weighing a pound; each stick being 4 oz) and half a quart of milk is a pint (also sold in grocery stores; it's also two cups).
- Mikhail_Edoshin 12y ago
  Not that inconsistent; if you look up the scale, you'll see that most ratios are powers of two; sometimes there's an occasional 1/3, like the teaspoon to tablespoon ratio. What is convenient is that the ratios are small; as soon as you need a bigger amount, you just use bigger units. This not only keeps the math simpler, but also indicates the precision of the numbers; "1 cup" means you can err by a tablespoon, perhaps, but "16 tablespoons" (although formally equal to 1 cup) indicates much higher degree of precision. In metric countries, however, you routinely see recipes like "140 g cornmeal" or hear people asking for "500 g meat" in a grocery store. Nobody really deals with these things in grams, but still somehow everybody uses grams here. The inventors of the metric system might think there would be decagrams or gectograms, but I've never heard of such units and even my spell checker just underlined them; somehow people using metric system ended up with kilograms and grams, units of 1:1000 ratio.

rdtsc 12y ago

> it's closer to a binary system, rather than decimal. Not sure I follow. We got : 1 yard = 3 feet = 36 inches how is that closer to binary, than say: 1m = 10dm = 100cm = 1000mm

spc476 12y ago
It's close, but not quite. 2 cups to 1 pint. 2 pints to one quart. 2 quarts to 1 gallon. But then there are the odd ones, like 3 feet to 1 yard, 3 teaspoons to 1 tablespoon (2 tablespoons is 1 dessertspoon though). But there is quite a bit of doubling in the Imperial system.

bnj 12y ago

I don't understand. It's just as easy to divide by half in a decimal system as in a binary system; both share 2 as a factor. My mathematician friends tell me that for a lot of reasons base twelve (like our clock) would be preferable, but changing makes no sense because the benefits don't come close to the costs... In any event, like and system of measurement, decimal is ultimately founded on some arbitrary decisions. The argument in favor of decimal is that a common system of measurement has incredible advantages; nothing you mentioned in favor of the imperial system stands up to the benefits to being in lockstep with the rest of civilization.

D_Alex 12y ago

>If baking, are you more likely to take a recipe and halve it or cut it by a factor of ten? You are more likely to halve it. How does the "American" system help, if you have to halve say 1 lb of butter and 1 quart of milk? It just means you need to retain in your head a bunch of definitions and inconsistent conversion factors.

spc476 12y ago
Well, half a pound of butter is two sticks (butter here is typically sold in four-stick packages weighing a pound; each stick being 4 oz) and half a quart of milk is a pint (also sold in grocery stores; it's also two cups).
Mikhail_Edoshin 12y ago
Not that inconsistent; if you look up the scale, you'll see that most ratios are powers of two; sometimes there's an occasional 1/3, like the teaspoon to tablespoon ratio. What is convenient is that the ratios are small; as soon as you need a bigger amount, you just use bigger units. This not only keeps the math simpler, but also indicates the precision of the numbers; "1 cup" means you can err by a tablespoon, perhaps, but "16 tablespoons" (although formally equal to 1 cup) indicates much higher degree of precision. In metric countries, however, you routinely see recipes like "140 g cornmeal" or hear people asking for "500 g meat" in a grocery store. Nobody really deals with these things in grams, but still somehow everybody uses grams here. The inventors of the metric system might think there would be decagrams or gectograms, but I've never heard of such units and even my spell checker just underlined them; somehow people using metric system ended up with kilograms and grams, units of 1:1000 ratio.