The Metric System and Anti-Scientific America

[Pulsar]

This reminds me of an article I read recently, about fuel efficiency, and the ridiculous unit 'miles per gallon'.

Here's a riddle: which saves more gasoline, going from a car with 10 mpg to one with 20 mpg, or going from 33 to 50 mpg?

Think for a while... on first glance, you would say going from 33 to 50 mpg. After all, you gain 17 mpg, compared to 10 mpg in the first option. Right? Well, no.

Here's why. Let's assume you drive 100 miles.
With a 10 mpg car, you need 10 gallons, and with a 20 mpg car, you need 5 gallons. So you save 5 gallons.
With a 33 mpg car, you need 3 gallons, and with a 50 mpg car, you need 2 gallons. You save 1 gallon.

In other words, the change from 10 mpg to 20 mpg saves you 5 times more gasoline than a change from 33 to 50 mpg.

If you would use a sensible unit, like 'liters per 100 km', you wouldn't have this problem.


Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

 

[ragnarokx297]

In other words, the change from 10 mpg to 20 mpg saves you 5 times more gasoline than a change from 33 to 50 mpg.

If you would use a sensible unit, like 'liters per 100 km', you wouldn't have this problem.


Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

Dude, you conclusion doesn't make any sense. The logic shows that the problem is in the format, not the types of units used. Like similarly, you wouldn't have this problem if you used "gallons per 100 miles". Any sort of [L]^3 / [L] would work, the specific units of length used would not matter.

On a side note, on first glance I picked the first one from 10 to 20, but it might be because I already knew what fuel efficiency in length per volume practically meant...

 

[Pulsar]

Like similarly, you wouldn't have this problem if you used "gallons per 100 miles". Any sort of [L]^3 / [L] would work, the specific units of length used would not matter.

Of course it would, but if you'd ever change the units, you might as well change them to metrics

 

[RichardMNixon]

In other words, the change from 10 mpg to 20 mpg saves you 5 times more gasoline than a change from 33 to 50 mpg.

If you would use a sensible unit, like 'liters per 100 km', you wouldn't have this problem.


Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

Dude, you conclusion doesn't make any sense. The logic shows that the problem is in the format, not the types of units used. Like similarly, you wouldn't have this problem if you used "gallons per 100 miles". Any sort of [L]^3 / [L] would work, the specific units of length used would not matter.

On a side note, on first glance I picked the first one from 10 to 20, but it might be because I already knew what fuel efficiency in length per volume practically meant...

Nah, I think it's fair, he referred to mpg as a unit in and of itself, and it is an American convention. By comparison, a Pascal is a kg/m-s^2, but no one would fight you that a Pascal is also a unit, just as mpg is used as a unit. It's just a poorly constructed unit.

 

[Commander Eagle]

Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

We do drive on the right side of the road.

EDIT: Realized after posting that it just says "Brits", not "non-Brits". It's a lot less funny now.

Well, to me, anyway. You guys would probably find laughing at my incompetence funnier than the joke that I was attempting to make.

 

[)O( Hytegia )O(]

Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

We do drive on the right side of the road.

EDIT: Realized after posting that it just says "Brits", not "non-Brits". It's a lot less funny now.

Well, to me, anyway. You guys would probably find laughing at my incompetence funnier than the joke that I was attempting to make.

Don't worry - I am. xD

 

[alimck]

"The metric system is the tool of the devil! My car gets forty rods to the hogshead and that's the way I likes it."

--Grandpa Simpson

 

[ragnarokx297]

Of course it would, but if you'd ever change the units, you might as well change them to metrics

Ok, if you change the units you might as well change them to metrics I agree, but the only thing I'm saying is the problem you posed was not one related to metric/nonmetric units. If by of course it would you mean to say of course the specific units of length in regards to being metric or not would in fact matter to the problem, then I've yet to see how.

Nah, I think it's fair, he referred to mpg as a unit in and of itself, and it is an American convention. By comparison, a Pascal is a kg/m-s^2, but no one would fight you that a Pascal is also a unit, just as mpg is used as a unit. It's just a poorly constructed unit.

I don't think you understand what I'm saying. I'm saying the problem is not one related to the American convention of using nonmetric units. If you were to argue that using L/L^3 instead of L^3/L is a disadvantageous American convention, thats fine, but you should then isolate the two conventions instead of implying that both are disadvantageous to the specific problem at hand by changing both at the same time for the solution. Pascal or mpg or lpk being a unit or not has nothing to do with it.

 

[nasher168]

Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

We do drive on the right side of the road...
You lot all drive on the wrong side.

 

[Eidolon]

Oh, on a related note, when are you Brits going to drive on the right side of the road?

We do drive on the right side of the road...
You lot all drive on the wrong side.

I like to drive all over the road just to be safe

 

[)O( Hytegia )O(]

On this derailment, I would like to make a comment:

I got caught speeding in Tenessee once, so I pretended to be a German person with an Alabama License, apologizing and saying that I was still getting used to being on the wrong side of the road. He left me alone without any real check, so I consider it a victory for both my staged-accent and my quick thinking.

 

[Master_Ghost_Knight]

There are some details I would like to add about this.
You are lucky to be using miles and mph because in aeronautical fields what is used is the nautical mile (for horizontal), feet (for vertical distance) and knots (for speed which isn't used anywhere else (except the feet) other than just to know the distance and the speed, because if you want to use the speed to estimate for instance aerodinamical forces you got to convert everything because no one else use those units as a standard for anything. And yet the international aeronautical convention are those same units because those stupid americans were the ones who most developed aeronautics, and it does bother me allot how the fuck can it be called a convention when they can't even decide for instance what the hell is the standard unit for distance. For a time I tried to work with this system but it is an absolutly time waster, plus because you have an extra step on converting between different units of the same measurment (while trying to process multiple results) compounded by the frustration of the time consumption added with the fact that you lose any sensibility of what you should expect it means that calculation errors become much more frequente. Now my phylosophy is, convert everything to metric, solve the problem and if you want the result in non-SI units then fuck you convert it yourself unless absolutly fundamental.

I can not tell how much difference does it make to use metric system instead of Royal system, the time you save to solve a problem while fidling arround back and forth between units of differente scales of the same type of measurment is almost half the time it takes to solve the actual problem. Something that wouldn't happen if you allways used the same unit for every magnitude of measurments, and the inovation of the metric system were:
1. the use of prefixes (like n=10^-9, m=10^-3, c=0.01, d=0.1, k=1000=10^3 and so foth) that you associate to the unit of measurment to jump magnitudes (and because it is all in units of 10 and because we work in base 10 the convertion between them is a simple step of shifting the decimal point or adding the sceintific notation exponent).
2. The congruency between relatable units, for instance since velocity [v]=[dp/dt]=[m/s], aceleration [a]=[dv/dt]=[m/s^2], force [F]=[M.a]=[Kg.m/s^2]=[N], power [P]=[F.v]=[N . m/s]=[Kg.m/s^2 . m/s]=[Kg.m^2/s^3]=[W], energy [E]=[F]*[d]=[Kg.m/s^2]*[m]=[Kg.(m/s)^2]=[N.m]=[j]=[N.m/s.s]=[W.s] and so forth, saving a bucket load of constants requiered to relate different measurments.
And that this is why this units were conventioned as the International Standard units (IS for short).

Although the IS system is very good it is not perfect and also there isn't any specific advantage on using for instance meters as a standard unit of distance if you could for instance find any other scale for distance (for instance feet, why not?) as long as you reconstructed all the other units to benefit from the same propreties as described above. In fact I strongly belive that the development of a praticaly enhanced plank units as the standard units of measurment would be even better than the metric units given that it would simply eliminae the necessity for the majority of the physical constants we use today like the Gravitical constant (which would simply be something of the sort 10^-n [EPforce/(EPweigt/EPdistnce)^2]), (even better than this would be to work on a more pratical base than 10 and construct the units in function of that base, but that is a different discution althogheter).


However the main population, not even in Europe uses fully the IS system, many people have refered forinstance the liter [l]=[dm^3] and the liter isn't an IS unit for volume the m^3 is, neither is the degrees celcius [,ºC]=[,ºK-273.15,º] the degrees Kelvin is (even tough they have the same scale the celcius is biased relative to the kelvin, the degrees celcius were once IS but before the time of the discovery of the absolute zero temperature from were the ,ºK were born). While the previous examples are relatable to the metric system the hour [h] in Km/h isn't, neither is the degree as a angle and I don't se anyone using the standard radian (the degree makes it easy to find right angles and identify quadrants but for any real usage there is no other angle than the radian, because: 1. radian is homotopic to 1 and therefor the only one that is capable of preserving the units of distnce when a angle is aplied, 2. The expansions series of sin a cosin work only if the value is radian).
And why the majority of the population don't use it? Because in day to day aplications they are simply not praticable, you don't go into the store to buy 0.001 cubic meters of beer, it makes almost no signifiant difference between 272,ºK and 288,ºK, if you are traveling at 19m/s and you have 200000m to run and calculating that it would take 10526s to do it is not only complicated as it is also meaningless.

On a side note, it would not be complicated for Americans to make the transition from royal to metric, all it takes is a couple of years priting everything with royal nd metric units, on public roads there aren't as many speed signs as one would think so, but with a local management and road legislation it is possible to star making cars whit instruments measuring in both systems (prety easy to do) and making speed signs with indications of ither both speeds or just km/h (granted that it is mandated that all cars have instruments in metric) with the indication km/h underneath the value (to inform that it is an updated sign in km/h). After several years when the transition as already setled and slightly enhance in the legislation can now make road signs permanently in Km/h while not having to specify that (tricky but doable).

 

[DepricatedZero]

Came upon this.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2010/06/metric-madness-how-automakers-refuse-to-give-it-up/1?loc=interstitialskip

I kind of laughed at how narrow minded this article is, and it brought me back to this thread. Thought it might contribute to the discussion. "Metric system needs to die"

 

[SagansHeroes]

Came upon this.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2010/06/metric-madness-how-automakers-refuse-to-give-it-up/1?loc=interstitialskip

I kind of laughed at how narrow minded this article is, and it brought me back to this thread. Thought it might contribute to the discussion. "Metric system needs to die"

That's nothing if not a little disconcerting. Hopefully it's not the popular consensus

 

[ExplorerAtHeart]

We tried to convert to the Metric System, but it mainly failed due the laziness of the American public to learn and adopt the system. The metric system is used by scientists though they offer a imperial conversion when they release their results. When i was in science class, every time the teachers taught that the metric system was the real system of science and the standard system should not be used in science. We never used the standard system in my science classes.

 

[AllMakesCombined]

If you're a car guy, and you want a 427, you probably already know that's about a 7.0 liter engine. It's common knowledge int he automotive enthusiast community that a 5.0 liter is a 305. If you're not a car guy, then you probably don't care what your displacement is.

The majority of Americans probably don't care one way or another, but I can say the biggest problem with converting everything to metric is nothing more than stubbornness. It's mainly an issue with our red necks and right-wing who have the attitude that it's un-American and not worth the effort or something just as ridiculous. After all, we all know any country in Europe is full of commie socialists, and to be like them would be letting the terrorists (or China) win. Never mind that even as a 32 year old, I still have to look up how many fucking feet are in a mile once in a while.

But remembering 12 inches in a foot, 3 feet in a yard, 1760 yards in a mile (yep, had to look it up again), etc is far more difficult than just remembering 10->10->10->10, and so on.

Standard/English/Royal/Imperial (w/e you want to call it) makes me feel stupid.

 

[nasher168]

On this derailment, I would like to make a comment:

I got caught speeding in Tenessee once, so I pretended to be a German person with an Alabama License, apologizing and saying that I was still getting used to being on the wrong side of the road. He left me alone without any real check, so I consider it a victory for both my staged-accent and my quick thinking.

:facepalm:
I think Germany actually drive on the right anyway :lol:

 

[MRaverz]

On this derailment, I would like to make a comment:

I got caught speeding in Tenessee once, so I pretended to be a German person with an Alabama License, apologizing and saying that I was still getting used to being on the wrong side of the road. He left me alone without any real check, so I consider it a victory for both my staged-accent and my quick thinking.

:facepalm:
I think Germany actually drive on the right anyway :lol:

All of Europe, bar the UK, drive on the left. I think there was some EU thing to sort everyone out.

Very few countries drive on the left, in fact loads of them are ex-British colonies.

 

[AllMakesCombined]

All of Europe, bar the UK, drive on the left. I think there was some EU thing to sort everyone out.

Very few countries drive on the left, in fact loads of them are ex-British colonies.

I don't know if it's coincidence or if there's a reason for it, but all the countries with right-hand-drive vehicles on the left side of the road are 'island' countries. UK, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, etc are all surrounded by water. South Africa being an exception -- I did have to google that to find out.

 

[Baranduin]

All of Europe, bar the UK, drive on the left. I think there was some EU thing to sort everyone out.

Very few countries drive on the left, in fact loads of them are ex-British colonies.

I thought Italians drove on the middle side of the road.

I have understood that the right-hand traffic is inherited from the roman empire, and continental communications have helped to keep and spread the standard. England and Ireland - and other european insular countries - had no need to agree with their neighbors about the correct side to drive.


Found this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-_and_left-hand_traffic