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

[JesterFace]

I made this thread to the TNG section originally, couldn't delete it there but might as well post it here..

As we know, starship personnel use metres and other non imperial measurements in their work and on dialog. If you're from a country that uses imperial measurements, like foot and pounds, in your everydays life, how do you react to these metres and grams. For me personally it's easy because we use the metric system in our everyday life, kilometres don't have to be thought as how many miles is that...

 

[Christopher]

I don't think there's any excuse in this day and age for not having at least a rough idea of how big a meter or a kilogram is. It's the measurement system almost every country in the world uses, it's the universal measurement system of science, space travel, and commerce, etc. It only makes sense that Starfleet in the future would use it (well, as far as Earth measurement systems go -- one could question why the Federation wouldn't use, say, Vulcan measurement units instead).

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Also in imperial unit countries, scientists still use metrics.

But even if you spent your entire life in a cattle ranch in the midwest wrapped in an American flag and have no idea what metrics are, the context always gives the audience everything they need to know. "Enemy ship is at 20000 kilometers and closing. 15000 kilometers. 10000 kilometers!" Even if you have no idea how long a kilometer is, you understand enough to get the scene.

 

[JoeZhang]

I don't think there's any excuse in this day and age for not having at least a rough idea of how big a meter or a kilogram is.

I have no really idea how much a Kilogram is and I wouldn't be alone in Brits my age (35+).

 

[Christopher]

But even if you spent your entire life in a cattle ranch in the midwest wrapped in an American flag and have no idea what metrics are, the context always gives the audience everything they need to know. "Enemy ship is at 20000 kilometers and closing. 15000 kilometers. 10000 kilometers!" Even if you have no idea how long a kilometer is, you understand enough to get the scene.

And of course, since a mile is only 1.6 kilometers, they're of the same order of magnitude, so a distance of tens of thousands of km is also a distance of tens of thousands of miles. For the most part, the order of magnitude is enough to get the idea across.

 

[MacLeod]

I don't think there's any excuse in this day and age for not having at least a rough idea of how big a meter or a kilogram is.

I have no really idea how much a Kilogram is and I wouldn't be alone in Brits my age (35+).

A meter is as big as you want it to be as in BrE that is a measuring device, metre would be the correct speeling for a unit of measurement.

I would disagree as a Brit who is 35+

1kg=2.2lb
30cm= approx 12in
1yd= around 90cm
1m=approx 3ft 3inchs
1pt = 568ml
1gal=4.53ltr

 

[AustNerevar]

Well, kids in American schools aren't taught how to use the metric system well enough. We need to just switch over entirely, but that would be a bit difficult to convince the culture to do. To say there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is a bit harsh. I was not properly educated on the metric system. That added to the fact that I always struggled with math, anyway, has made it so that any dialogue regarding the metric system sounds like total gibberish to me.

Whenever the characters on the show mentions that something is so and so meters away or that this ship is so many meters large, I just don't worry about that part. It's not always pertinent information, anyway.

 

[MacLeod]

But a change from Imperial to Metric wouldn't happen over night it would take a decade or two. Just teach both systems. No doubt the USA would end up with a hybrid system of both like the UK. We still measure distance in miles, ask a person here height and they are fairly kiley to give it feet and inches, weather is likely to be given in C, buy loose fruit and veg from a shop and it's sold in Kg, by a bottles of alcohol and it'll be in ml/cl etc.. You can still by Milk by the pint but it'll still labelled with the metric quantity. Fuel is bought by the litre, but MPG is often given by the Gallon.

 

[AustNerevar]

I'm sure it would take much longer than just two decades. At least three, probably four.

 

[Timo]

I doubt the Federation really uses a standard unit of any sort - the Universal Translator would do away with any need for such. After all, it does fluent conversions in many an episode where complete aliens seemingly use units like "hour" or "minute"! We can safely assume, then, that whenever Kira says "Two point six meters behind this wall, Sir!", she's really saying "Gubba moop 8.22 gittadon uptuh, Sir!" and the technology is working its magic...

Apart from that, it seems even our TOS heroes get their metric/SI units right basically all the time; it's their imperials that sometimes seem erroneous, as with "ounces" of antimatter being sufficient to rip out a planetoid's atmosphere. Except of course for this classic case:

"Enemy ship is at 20000 kilometers and closing. 15000 kilometers. 10000 kilometers!"

If the enemy ship really spends two seconds crossing mere 5000 kilometers, it's not much of a starship!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[C.E. Evans]

I measure things in kellicams!

 

[Mad Mike]

A meter is as big as you want it to be as in BrE that is a measuring device, metre would be the correct speeling for a unit of measurement.

While that is the correct spelling in the vast majority of the world, here in America meter is the correct spelling for both the device, and the unit of measurement. Thank you for the conversion chart though.

 

[Christopher]

To say there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is a bit harsh. I was not properly educated on the metric system.

Learning should be an active process, not a passive one. What we learn is as much a function of our own initiative and curiosity as of what others choose to teach us. If others don't properly educate you on something, that's not an excuse to remain in the dark -- it's an incentive to find out for yourself.

 

[Trekker4747]

I use my knowledge of metric measurements to know how much they're talking about.

 

[MacLeod]

I'm sure it would take much longer than just two decades. At least three, probably four.

Maybe, maybe not.

The US is what one of only 3 countries in the world not to use the metric system? Surely that is not beneficial to the US is the global economy? Sure older people might have more trouble adjusting to SI units but the younger generation(s) are simply brought up with it and it becomes the norm. People using different systems can cause confusion i.e. didn't NASA lose a probe because a contractor used Imperial instead of SI units. Even discussions on the Internet can cause confusion i.e ask someone what the temapture today was and they might say 40 now is that hot or cold, it depends if you are using C or F doesn't it? To something like 95% of the worlds population they would say that's hot, to something 5% they would say it's cold. Of course it's a non issue when they write 40F but more often or not the scale is never given.

 

[Mad Mike]

To say there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is a bit harsh. I was not properly educated on the metric system.

Learning should be an active process, not a passive one. What we learn is as much a function of our own initiative and curiosity as of what others choose to teach us. If others don't properly educate you on something, that's not an excuse to remain in the dark -- it's an incentive to find out for yourself.

Saying that there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is VERY harsh and it's mostly been because of elitist attitudes like this that I've never had much interest in the metric system.

I've made it forty-three years on this Earth just fine using the old, reliable, Imperial system and I have a perfect excuse. The metric system has no bearing on the quality of my life and I couldn't care less about it.

The majority of the world uses it: good for them, I promise I won't go to France and expect them to sell me three pounds of coffee without them feeling annoyed.

The metric system may be the universal system for international commerce, but it is in no way shape or form used that much in American commerce. Not only do I regularly buy bulk items by the pound, but for almost a decade (before my health went south) I was a weighmaster at a local recycling plant. Even on a corporate level, we did all our transactions by the pound or by the imperial ton. A great deal of our corrugated cardboard was shipped to China and Canada and all of the paperwork (at least on our end) listed imperial weights.

The bottom line is I don't need and I don't want it. It doesn't mean that I don't believe learning should be an active process, I simply have no use for it and the only benefit to learning it would be not having to look up a conversion every once in a very long while.

 

[LMFAOschwarz]

To say there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is a bit harsh. I was not properly educated on the metric system.

Learning should be an active process, not a passive one. What we learn is as much a function of our own initiative and curiosity as of what others choose to teach us. If others don't properly educate you on something, that's not an excuse to remain in the dark -- it's an incentive to find out for yourself.

Saying that there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is VERY harsh and it's mostly been because of elitist attitudes like this that I've never had much interest in the metric system.

Back in the mid 70's we were told in school that we'd be converting to the metric system in "the near future". They must've been measuring 'near' on a geological time scale. Either that...or once again, school was wrong.

Nonetheless, I was a trooper, and even sent away for a standard/metric conversion table. I do find metric useful when scaling down for, say, model building and such. One hundred feet equals 100 millimeters makes the grasp of distance very easy to visualize and work with. It does get tiresome to count the 1/16ths on a ruler.

Otherwise, I don't use it. And I see no reason to convert to it. It doesn't make anything "better", weights and lengths are what the are, whether measured in meters or miles (or kellicams ). It's similar to Daylight Savings Time in that it doesn't really give you an hour more of time.

 

[MacLeod]

To say there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is a bit harsh. I was not properly educated on the metric system.

Learning should be an active process, not a passive one. What we learn is as much a function of our own initiative and curiosity as of what others choose to teach us. If others don't properly educate you on something, that's not an excuse to remain in the dark -- it's an incentive to find out for yourself.

Saying that there's no excuse for not knowing how to use the metric system is VERY harsh and it's mostly been because of elitist attitudes like this that I've never had much interest in the metric system.

I've made it forty-three years on this Earth just fine using the old, reliable, Imperial system and I have a perfect excuse. The metric system has no bearing on the quality of my life and I couldn't care less about it.

The majority of the world uses it: good for them, I promise I won't go to France and expect them to sell me three pounds of coffee without them feeling annoyed.

The metric system may be the universal system for international commerce, but it is in no way shape or form used that much in American commerce. Not only do I regularly buy bulk items by the pound, but for almost a decade (before my health went south) I was a weighmaster at a local recycling plant. Even on a corporate level, we did all our transactions by the pound or by the imperial ton. A great deal of our corrugated cardboard was shipped to China and Canada and all of the paperwork (at least on our end) listed imperial weights.

The bottom line is I don't need and I don't want it. It doesn't mean that I don't believe learning should be an active process, I simply have no use for it and the only benefit to learning it would be not having to look up a conversion every once in a very long while.

But isn't it about what is best for future generations? Like any change the current generation can have a harder time adapting to the change, so sure the Imperial system worked for you but will it work as well for the Millenium generation?

 

[Metryq]

As you might guess by my alias, I prefer the Metric (SI) system. The odd spelling is to avoid that "name in use" error when joining forums or signing up for email accounts.

Back in the mid 70's we were told in school that we'd be converting to the metric system in "the near future". They must've been measuring 'near' on a geological time scale.

^ This. I remember sitting there in grade school in the '70s being told the switch would come "soon." I have yet to run into any 21st century kids using SI units. If Imperial units were base 10, I probably wouldn't have been so gung ho to switch. But Imperial units use base 12, base 16, base 8—you name it. I have no need for fractions like 13/57ths. While wondering where they came up with 5280 feet in a mile, I learned about "rods" and "furlongs," which I had never heard of despite growing up in a country immersed in such units. I thought furlongs were only for horse races. An ounce is both a volume and a weight measure. And having short and long tons is just begging for trouble...

...speaking of which, that space probe or joint project—whatever it was—I remember hearing one author blame Metric for the problem. How about blaming the engineer who made the slipshod conversion? What, no Metric tools in the workshop?

While living in Miami for a few years, I remember someone from South America trying to place an order at the deli in grams. The server said, "Huh?" I stepped in and was able to give some rough conversions.

 

[scotpens]

Otherwise, I don't use it. And I see no reason to convert to it. It doesn't make anything "better", weights and lengths are what the are, whether measured in meters or miles (or kellicams ). It's similar to Daylight Savings Time in that it doesn't really give you an hour more of time.

Well, the metric system is "better" in the that it's simpler -- all units are in multiples of ten, whereas the imperial system is all over the map -- 12 inches to the foot, 5,280 feet to the mile, 32 ounces to the quart, whatever.

Or, what Metryq said.

And of course Daylight Saving Time doesn't "create" an extra hour -- its purpose is to take advantage of the longer daylight hours during those months.