If you aren't familiar with metre/meters and so on...

[MacLeod]

I remember learning the metric system in school in the 70's. "Get ready America!"



We are way too stubborn for that. Besides, nowadays converting to the metric system would be seen as one more step toward World Gubment. "How many liters of fuel does a Black Helicopter need to get from it's secret base to your hometown?"



Seriously though I lived in Australia for a year, and didn't find it too difficult.

I wouldn't be surpsied if the military is already using metric (in part maybe because of NATO) and isn't aviation fuel measured by weight ie. Kg. As you need to know the weight of an aircraft including payload, to see if the plane will generate enough lift to take off.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

I am a firm believer that the popular eschewing of the metric system is a direct cause of US students' abysmal performance in math and science. And without an ingrained sense of SI units (because science is done in SI, not Imperial or US or whatever), and moreover with the attitude that the metric system is "elitist" or "European" or "not needed," they will continue to fall behind.

I wouldn't be surpsied if the military is already using metric ...

No doubt. It's my understanding that most states in the US are also officially metric as well (in that all business and civil planning is conducted in metric, etc...). It just hasn't carried over to Joe Six-Pack, because he doesn't want to be known as Joe-2.13 L.

 

[MacLeod]

^That maybe true, but the politicans have to have the will to see it through, and think this will better enable our children to compete on the world stage. The Imperial system is also European (British), so that's hardly a reason not to adopt it. The basic argument for not adopting it seems to be :

We've always used this system and it suits me just fine, I don't care if it be benefical to future generations to adopt it.

 

[Kevman7987]

We've always used this system and it suits me just fine, I don't care if it be benefical to future generations to adopt it.

Imho that is the fault of the "Baby Boomer" generation's worldview. Come back and check America when the Millennials are running the country in 30 years.

 

[MacLeod]

We've always used this system and it suits me just fine, I don't care if it be benefical to future generations to adopt it.

Imho that is the fault of the "Baby Boomer" generation's worldview. Come back and check America when the Millennials are running the country in 30 years.

The same "Baby Boomer" generation that made the change in places like Australia and the UK?

 

[T'Girl]

I am a firm believer that the popular eschewing of the metric system is a direct cause of US students' abysmal performance in math and science.

In the past decade the United States has generated about forty-five Nobel laureates in the sciences.

How's your metric country doing in that particular metric?

 

[MacLeod]

Fingers on buzzers which system of measurement do scientist use?

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Fingers on buzzers: how many shopkeepers should be threatened with fines because of the mistakes of a few scientists?

Hint: more than 99%.

 

[Duane]

I was taught the metric system in the US when I was in the 3rd or 4th grade, circa 1973 or 1974. We would have sworn back then that by 2014 the US would be 100% metric. We also would have sworn that we would have a colony on the moon by now.

 

[T'Girl]

I was taught the metric system in school as well, and probably know it fairly well. It apparently isn't necessary for it to be the "official system" for the scientists within our society to employ it in their work.

Perhaps having two systems is a good thing, makes you think.

We should all live in a world where ounces and grams exist peacefully side by side.

 

[Mudd]

The metric system is more of a nuisance in the U.S. than it is necessary knowledge. I know metric length/distance intuitively but am barely cognizant of weights and volumes.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

I am a firm believer that the popular eschewing of the metric system is a direct cause of US students' abysmal performance in math and science.

In the past decade the United States has generated about forty-five Nobel laureates in the sciences.

Two things: (1) being from an American institution and being from (educated in) the US aren't necessarily the same thing. And more importantly: (2) it isn't the CURRENT students who are winning Nobel Prizes. The US is falling behind in math and science -- this is not up for debate.

How's your metric country doing in that particular metric?

Well, I guess they're taking all the other Nobel Prizes?

 

[Bad Thoughts]

I am a firm believer that the popular eschewing of the metric system is a direct cause of US students' abysmal performance in math and science.

In the past decade the United States has generated about forty-five Nobel laureates in the sciences.

Two things: (1) being from an American institution and being from (educated in) the US aren't necessarily the same thing. And more importantly: (2) it isn't the CURRENT students who are winning Nobel Prizes. The US is falling behind in math and science -- this is not up for debate.

Conversely, many countries that use the metric system have unremarkable contributions in science and technology. Using the metric system is not, in and of itself, a measure of a the scientific savviness of the native population. Moreover, there are more fundamental issues in US education that ought to be resolved first: teaching training and pay, the reputation of teachers at all levels, access to education, finance and student debt, and the tendency for subjects to be pushed into the college years. Enforcing the metric system would be little more than a band-aid.

 

[varek]

I have to keep looking up the conversion tables, since we Americans still predominantly use inches, feet, yards, etc.

Back in 1985, a Canadian taxi-driver in Saskatchewan told me that they had had some trouble adjusting to the new metric system. He said one farmer mistakenly put too much fertilizer on his crops and burned them up!

So, I guess it was a learning process even in some Commonwealth countries, eh?

 

[Timo]

Perhaps having two systems is a good thing, makes you think.

The SI system is good for science because the units can be used together in sensible ways. Any other system, such as imperial, is good for science because it makes absolutely no practical sense and hence forces the would-be scientists and engineers to

a) think
b) learn to do conversions for even the simplest calculations!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[MacLeod]

The metric system is more of a nuisance in the U.S. than it is necessary knowledge. I know metric length/distance intuitively but am barely cognizant of weights and volumes.

But would you become more cognisant of them if you used them daily? I suspect that you would. If you were dealing in Kg's day in day out you would seen become familiar with them.

Or is this the argument for not adopting it :-

I'm not familair with the metric system so I don't think we should adopt it?

Without some realising that by adopting it given time you would become familar with it. Other countries have gone through it and no doubt these arguments were used.

 

[T'Girl]

... and hence forces the would-be scientists and engineers to

a) think
b) learn to do conversions for even the simplest calculations!

c) simply know both systems.

In America, if your job requires the metric system (few actually do), learn both systems. When you are at work, use the system you're work requires. Actually quite a few jobs require specialized knowledge, vocabulary, skills.

Correct me if I'm misremembering Timo, but don't you speak (at least) two languages? Do you find this confusing? I'm guessing not.

 

[MacLeod]

^How many jobs actually requie you to know a system of measurement?

Scientfic
Perhaps Engineering or certain Engineering sectors
Perhaps cooking

any others?

The first one as I think we've already established use metric
It is possible certain sectors of Engineering use metric

 

[Timo]

c) simply know both systems.

Let's make no mistake here: only SI is a system. All the global alternatives to it are merely collections of unrelated units, so that when these units are combined, they beget a menagerie of further unrelated units. It's not merely a case of one system having decimal magnitudes to the various measurements and others having weirder numerical values.

But yes, knowing both the SI system and at least one non-system is helpful in realizing what systems of measurements are all about.

Correct me if I'm misremembering Timo, but don't you speak (at least) two languages? Do you find this confusing? I'm guessing not.

I'd happily have my native language(s) die a horrible death, followed by the deaths of all other languages on Earth save one. It wouldn't significantly matter which one, as all languages are fairly silly constructs (although clearly there are some grossly inferior ones, in terms of incomprehensible grammar or ill-defined spelling or whatnot). But a global language would definitely be a good thing in my books.

Knowing more than one language doesn't really teach you much about the world, the way knowing about various units of measurements would. It barely teaches you about languages, really. But languages are not important. If we somehow standardized on one language today, and everybody forgot all about other previously existing languages, by the end of the northern summer we would be back to having seven billion languages anyway - language is such a personal thing. Personal and unimportant: two people talking past each other can still get business done. Indeed, all business is done that way...

Not so with units of measurement.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

^How many jobs actually requie you to know a system of measurement?

And, how many of those jobs require knowledge of the metric system?

Certain not cooking. As I mentioned earlier, while Canada is official metric, canadian construction works use the imperial system for actual construction. American plumbers do just fine with the American Customary system, as do our construction workers. My own family memberswho work at Boeing Aircraft build the jets using blueprints with the American Customary System, commonly employing tolerances down to 0.003 of a inch.

Science and drug companies do use the metric system.