Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States.

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Google says America has 337 languages, including signed languages. None of which is a "official' language.

Does anyone here have an official language in their country?

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Wikipedia says that there are 176 countries with at least one legally recognized official language.

I brought this up because it was a heated talking point on the West Wing, but yes I did wonder what the social/fiscal benefit was of declaring an official language?

The wiki says it's a little bit about exclusion, controlling minorities. By stating that English above Spanish (for example) is the official language of America, the bureaucracy no longer has to (so vehemently) supply redundancies of every piece of paperwork in multiple languages, after which it then becomes the burden of the citizenry to accept the offical language of the land.

Sure that seems a little assholey, but think of the billions they could save in stenography bills and photocopying? Of course, it also means that 1/2 a million secretaries are out of a job.

Stuff.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Ever since I took chemistry in high school, I've thought that chemistry sets would be tremendously useful in the kitchen (the glassware, not the chemicals). Most of my grandmother's recipe books were in Imperial measurements, the newer ones were "bilingual," and I had to go out and get new measuring cups and spoons with metric measurements on them.

I don't understand ounces. I can't visualize what an ounce of anything looks like. I can't make a guesstimate of how much liquid to pour into a glass if someone tells me to pour a specific number of ounces. But after 4 years of chemistry, heavy on the labwork, and everything here being sold in milliliters and liters, I have no problem with the metric measurements.

As for this "handful of this" and a "pinch of that"... gah.

I think this was asked and answered upthread. Federally, Canada's official languages are English and French. If I'm not mistaken, the province of New Brunswick is also officially bilingual.

The territory of Nunavut has English, French, and Inuktitut. And according to Wikipedia, the Northwest Territories has those languages plus at least a half dozen other First Nations languages that I assume are considered official for the purpose of legal documents and court proceedings.

I'm not sure offhand about the Yukon.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Welsh is an official language of Wales.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Sure, and, as I said, that's appropriate in science and technology. Not so necessary in everyday life, especially in a world where people can just point their iPhones at stuff rather than learn something.

I'm familiar with the story. It was human error. There are thousands, if not millions, of collaborative endeavors going on at all times that involve translations of language and and measurement. That's a reason to get things right, not a reason to homogenize the world.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

As far as units of measurement are involved, the world is homogenized.

The World minus America, Liberia and Burma.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

I remember watching British TV around a decade ago, there was a new law implemented about storing having to use metric weights for foods, and the news did a number of vox pops with shoppers to gauge their reaction. The consensus seemed to be that these new metric rules were an attack on British culture. That made me angry, that people could be so stupid. Culture and identity are deeper routed than that, and if your sense of your nation's culture is tied up with what units you use to weigh potatoes then something has gotten seriously screwed up, either in your head or in your society.

But the truth is that such sentiments are merely excuses. Opposition to metrification has nothing to do with the loss of culture or opposition to homogenisation. It's based on the simple stubbornness of not wanting to adapt to a new system, even if it is simpler and more sensible. But people don't want to admit that they're too lazy to change, so they reach for other reasons, be it the patriotic stand against foreign numbers, or the principled opposition to the soulless minions of orthodoxy. So these days I just roll my eyes or chuckle when the old excuses get rolled out.

There is only one decent reason to oppose the conversion to metric, and that is that it will cost money. And what deserves money more, schools and hospitals, or some government department that will oversee the transition?

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

How much money does your average government spend on the betterment of puppies every year?

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Iraq
Iran
Nth Korea

Where is your Axis of Evil now?!

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Well given the choice between spending my taxes on things like Health, Police etc.. and changing roadsigns to metric. I'll go with not using my taxes to change road signs to metric.

Then of course there is the other aspect that most cars in the UK have odometer's which show miles, speedometer's and whilst most speedometers show km it's in a smaller case so not always as easy to glance at.

But what benefit would changing all the roadsigns in the UK to metric be?

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

Has there been too much drift for me to show up with a response to the OP?

I'll go with Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, for hope of the influence they would have on the U.S.

I'd have chosen three out of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the U.K., but since they and us are part of "Five Eyes" and have thus apparently already decided that we ARE one country in at least a couple of very important ways, I don't see much point.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

You don't want to cut unemployment down to Zero?

There's enough work for the entire country, there's just not enough work that the country is willing to pay for.

Besides if you try to pay 3 million people 15 to 20 dollars an hour for the next 5 years to convert all the road signs in America... The prisons are just going to underbid that contract because they can pay their labour forces 80 cents an hour.

Infrastructure is a problem with America. Sure there's busy work like this, but there's also probably millions of posted road signs that just plain actually have to be replaced for real reasons or outright planted in the first place.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

That's a pity.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

i'd invite the new england states to be part of the uk. possibly as an eventual replacement for scotland.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

If there were 90 regions of the planet dedicated to different unique units of measurement, how would that make commerce better?

You don't have to go so far back into history to find that %99 of all the people in the world didn't know how to count past forty, rather than that there were thousands of isolated regionally specific methods of measurement.

At least we can put the NTCS vs PAL argument to bed.

 

Re: Name 3 countries you'd consider inviting to join the United States

It isn't obsolete, just out of use. It's the unit of measurement we deserve, but not the one we need right now.