[muglo] Re: RANT on Canadian imperial settings & politics(was Re: OS Autoconnect)
- From: Harold Merton <harold.merton@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: muglo@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 29 Jul 2003 11:36:15 -0400
If you think F was stupid for measurements how about Celcius. When it began the
idiot had water boiling at Zero degrees and freezing at 100 degrees. Many years
later a more sensible scholar decided it would be better to switch it around so
it
froze at the cold temperature and boiled at the hotter. But then again this was
the beginning of metric.
"Eric D." wrote:
> on 24/7/03 2:49 PM, Tee Cashmore at tee.cashmore@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>
> > Eric D wrote:
> >
> >> RANT WARNING:.....
> >>
> >> If people want to be dumb enough to use imperial measures, why don't they
> >> just start using base-12 or base-16 for calculations (base-16 would be
> >> about
> >> as logical and easy to use as pounds, inches, feet, yards, miles, ounces,
> >> quarts, gallons, etc.)?
> >>
> >> Anyway, that's my _incoherent_ rant on the subject!!!
> >>
> >> Eric.
> >>
> >>
> > My Expat Brit Ranting.
> > While I agree with your sentiments, methinks you had better visit the UK
> > sometime. Imperial is used often, but metric is making big inroads, even
> > on my last visit in 1999, partly because of the Euro & ECC. Most
> > Canadians still think in Imperial; check the supermarket's pricing.
> > TTFN,
> > TeeC
>
> Exactly where I'm moving in three months :)
>
> I guess I'll be able to make first hand observations then, but from
> incidental news stories and personal web experience it seems that the UK is
> where Canada was two decades ago or so (though, I guess I don't know how far
> metric has infiltrated the public psyche). Didn't supermarts have to start
> selling stuff in kg and L two or three years ago? (I seem to remember
> interviews with some indignant shop keepers predicting this was the demise
> of "the British way" and threatening to ignore the new law (as a 6th
> generation Scottish descendent I say, damn the British way :) I was also
> stunned to find out that the UK still uses miles for distance (all the
> UK-based map sites use miles and those British cop shows show speeds in
> MPH).
>
> I think a sizeable segment of my generation (30 & <) is "bilingual" and I've
> encountered a number of people who are nearly exclusively metric (which I
> found a little surprising). I never mastered two of NA's imperial systems --
> ounces (for weight and volume), and Farenheit and, as I ranted earlier,
> Farenheit is perhaps the *worst* of the imperial units since its measurement
> scale has little relevance to anything in nature (like the freezing or
> boiling point of water).
>
> I wish the damned shops would use kg as their prominent units rather than
> lbs. Bananas for $.29/lbs or $.69/kg are about the only prices I know in kg
> ;). Maybe I should start harassing store managers to let them know my
> dissatisfaction with the lbs-preferred state of affairs!
>
> Until the shops make a formal switch to highlight kg instead of lbs imperial
> weight will persist as the unit of choice for weight (but, it seems like
> volume is now nearly exclusively L -- gallons may get listed but
> by-and-large volumes are now L only).
>
> I just find it so funny -- the metric system is now nearly 200 years old and
> it is *undeniably* the better measurement systme (I can't think of a single
> *advantage* to imperial that is not rooted in tradition), yet a number of
> countries still haven't made a full switch (plus, imperial is a cost on
> business -- it's illogical to have 12 inches to a foot but only 3 feet to a
> yard).
>
> Eric.
>
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