[muglo] Re: RANT on Canadian imperial settings & politics(wasRe: OS Autoconnect)

Perhaps not so "more sensible" after all.

;-) Garth

http://www.astro.uu.se/history/celsius_scale.html



> 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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> 
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