Why the US is not metric and why it won't be any time soon

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MaxE
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17 Aug 2014, 11:23 am

(due to the focus on US culture, which seems to be a hot topic, I have posted this here instead of Science and Technology)

It may surprise forum members to learn that in the late 70's the US had officially begun the metrication process, more or less in concert with Canada.

In 1982, the Reagan Administration (in the person of Lyn Nofziger) discontinued the policy. Along with removing the solar panels from the roof of the White House, this is another reason I can't bring myself to totally love Reagan despite the many great things he achieved as President.

I think the subsequent meteoric rise of Libertariansim as the most potent intellectual force in US politics guarantees the government will not undertake a new metrication program in my lifetime.

Having said that, I think there are valid reasons why Americans haven't adopted the metric system on their own. In my opinion, the "English" system of measurements and the Fahrenheit temperature scale are more "human-scaled". I'll give an example for each.

When one person gives their height to another, if they're a typical adult, it is always "one meter something", a small (mostly male) minority exceeds two meters. Even for most children, I don't know at what age the average child attains one meter in height, but many of us probably can't remember having been less than one meter tall. Whereas in British units, an adult can be anywhere from under 5 feet to over 7 feet and still be considered more-or-less normal. The actress Brooke Shields is 6 feet tall, which for a woman is more or less the benchmark for being "really tall", as in "she's a six-footer!".

As for temperature, the Celsius scale makes scientific sense in that zero and 100 correspond to the freezing and boiling temperature of water (at least at sea level), but in terms of reporting the weather, most Americans are comfortable with the notion that the outside temperature is almost always within the range of 0 - 100 Fahrenheit. Living in the Mid Atlantic, which is about as temperate as one can imagine, it is generally true that if the temperature goes above 100 or below zero, it's extreme. The Celsius scale gives doesn't give you the same convenient way to express the concept of "extreme temperature".

Two other observations:

1.) The pound is an actual unit of weight. It makes perfect sense for a school child to say that, on the Moon, they'd weigh a certain number of pounds less then they do on earth. I can remember visiting a Museum of Natural History in which could be found scales that were calibrated according to what one would weigh on the Moon and various planets. On the other hand, the kilogram is a unit of mass, so for somebody to tell you they "weigh" 70 kg is outright incorrect. The correct metric unit is the newton and it has always perplexed me that people don't give their weight in newtons.
2.) I get the impression that the British, in their day-to-day life, have never completely adopted the metric system, in particular, not nearly to the extent the Canadians have. I believe most British (or at least English) still give their weight in stone, etc. I can't offer direct proof but am curious how British forum members react to this observation.


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Raptor
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17 Aug 2014, 11:36 am

I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.


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TallyMan
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17 Aug 2014, 12:02 pm

Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.


Not so many years ago, NASA crashed an expensive probe into Mars instead of putting it into orbit around the planet... the cause was people at NASA using a mixture of metric and imperial units and someone fumbled the units and gave the wrong value for the thruster burn. Someone had worked out the figure in imperial but the person entering the data fed it in as metric (without converting it first) or vice-versa. Either way it was a stupid and avoidable mistake. Funny in a way though.

The sooner the entire planet converts to metric the better for everyone, especially scientists and engineers. Metric units are much easier to manipulate than imperial.


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0_equals_true
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17 Aug 2014, 12:03 pm

Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.


The UK is not totally metric, even it is is officially.

Heck some industries have traditionally promoted mixed units..



MaxE
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17 Aug 2014, 12:04 pm

Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.

I agree. No problem if your speedometer is calibrated in miles per hour but please let the parts be metric.


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17 Aug 2014, 12:08 pm

MaxE wrote:
Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.

I agree. No problem if your speedometer is calibrated in miles per hour but please let the parts be metric.


Standardization don't prevent you getting imperial parts.

Ever buy a set of sockets for your wrench? You can get both in the same set. It is called internationalization. Car parts are made all over the world.

k p.h is just weird if you are used to m.p.h.



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17 Aug 2014, 12:09 pm

MaxE wrote:
Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.

I agree. No problem if your speedometer is calibrated in miles per hour but please let the parts be metric.


The speedometer in my car is in miles per hour because I bought it in the UK. However, all the speed limits here in France are in Kilometres per hour, which can be a bit confusing at times. There is a scale on the speedo in Km/hour but it is too faint to see very well. I have to stare intently at the speedo if I'm anywhere near a speed camera or cop to make sure I'm within the Km/hour speed limit. I can never remember the converted speeds except that the 50 Km/hour limit translates to around 30 MPH.


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Jacoby
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17 Aug 2014, 12:58 pm

Conversion is too hard and American units or whatever you want to call them are more practical to our every day lives thus the incentive to learn metric is very little. I think it should be taught but conversion should be voluntary, if it is truly a better and easier system then it will win out in the end without government coercion.



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17 Aug 2014, 1:14 pm

MaxE wrote:
I get the impression that the British, in their day-to-day life, have never completely adopted the metric system, in particular, not nearly to the extent the Canadians have. I believe most British (or at least English) still give their weight in stone, etc. I can't offer direct proof but am curious how British forum members react to this observation.

Progress is slow.

My grandparents would use all sorts of weird measurements like furlongs, fluid ounces and hundredweight that I do not understand at all.

My parents will use feet, inches, yards and miles, but not the more obscure distances; they also exclusively use imperial units of mass and are comfortable with Fahrenheit.

My generation sometimes report their own weight and height in imperial units, buy beer by the pint, and use miles to describe long distances. Fahrenheit baffles us and we often do not know how many xs are in a y (except for inches in a foot, which I think is 12, and 14 pounds in a stone? 3 feet in a yard?). For everything else, we use metric measurements.



beneficii
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17 Aug 2014, 1:54 pm

Jacoby wrote:
Conversion is too hard and American units or whatever you want to call them are more practical to our every day lives thus the incentive to learn metric is very little. I think it should be taught but conversion should be voluntary, if it is truly a better and easier system then it will win out in the end without government coercion.


Actually, right now the government is prohibiting complete metrication of food labels regulated under the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act. The Act requires the printing of both English and metric units.

I support amending it to require only metric units, with the addition of English units being optional. I think at that point many companies would stop putting English units on their labels and go by the metric units, as they won't have to then have separate packaging for the U.S. and for other countries.


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17 Aug 2014, 2:48 pm

beneficii wrote:
Jacoby wrote:
Conversion is too hard and American units or whatever you want to call them are more practical to our every day lives thus the incentive to learn metric is very little. I think it should be taught but conversion should be voluntary, if it is truly a better and easier system then it will win out in the end without government coercion.


Actually, right now the government is prohibiting complete metrication of food labels regulated under the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act. The Act requires the printing of both English and metric units.

I support amending it to require only metric units, with the addition of English units being optional. I think at that point many companies would stop putting English units on their labels and go by the metric units, as they won't have to then have separate packaging for the U.S. and for other countries.


Except that defeats the purpose of the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act, Americans wouldn't know what they're buying.

Metrication efforts should probably be more focused on children, I don't think you'll ever win over the adult population since they simply do not want to learn new maths. I think in pounds and inches, I know what a mile is, I know what the temperature is. Putting a deadline or forcing Americans to convert will just cause backlash as it did in the 70s, Americans do not like being coerced.



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17 Aug 2014, 4:05 pm

The U.S. will not become metric by law mostly because of habit and politics. However both metric and British measurement are used in the U.S. and you can be sure any items made for export will be measured in metric.

So speed limit signs will remain being posted in miles per hour and distance in miles. It is easy to convert from British to metric and back for speed limits and distances.

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17 Aug 2014, 5:18 pm

TallyMan wrote:
Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.


Not so many years ago, NASA crashed an expensive probe into Mars instead of putting it into orbit around the planet... the cause was people at NASA using a mixture of metric and imperial units and someone fumbled the units and gave the wrong value for the thruster burn. Someone had worked out the figure in imperial but the person entering the data fed it in as metric (without converting it first) or vice-versa. Either way it was a stupid and avoidable mistake. Funny in a way though.

The sooner the entire planet converts to metric the better for everyone, especially scientists and engineers. Metric units are much easier to manipulate than imperial.


Yeah, that's what came to mind when I thought about this. That incident was in 1999 I believe.


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beneficii
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17 Aug 2014, 5:25 pm

Jacoby wrote:
beneficii wrote:
Jacoby wrote:
Conversion is too hard and American units or whatever you want to call them are more practical to our every day lives thus the incentive to learn metric is very little. I think it should be taught but conversion should be voluntary, if it is truly a better and easier system then it will win out in the end without government coercion.


Actually, right now the government is prohibiting complete metrication of food labels regulated under the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act. The Act requires the printing of both English and metric units.

I support amending it to require only metric units, with the addition of English units being optional. I think at that point many companies would stop putting English units on their labels and go by the metric units, as they won't have to then have separate packaging for the U.S. and for other countries.


Except that defeats the purpose of the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act, Americans wouldn't know what they're buying.


Experience in other countries shows that not to be a problem. When labels are metricated, people of all ages adapt. They actually get used to the measurements and begin to develop an intuition for them.

So, yes, Americans would learn what they're buying pretty quick, just like the Japanese learned what they were buying when they metricated, just like the Australians learned what they were buying when they metricated, just like just about any other country when they metricated.

I think Americans are just as capable of learning and getting used to metric as those people in those other countries.

Don't you? You don't think Americans are less capable than people of other nationalities to learn a new measurement system, do you?

Also, when the BATF required metric on alcoholic beverages (except for beer, I think) back in the late 70s, we got used to that pretty darn quick! On wine, champagne, and other beverages, English units were replaced by metric units, but there was no big disaster from it and those beverages remain metricated to this day.

Quote:
Metrication efforts should probably be more focused on children, I don't think you'll ever win over the adult population since they simply do not want to learn new maths. I think in pounds and inches, I know what a mile is, I know what the temperature is. Putting a deadline or forcing Americans to convert will just cause backlash as it did in the 70s, Americans do not like being coerced.


Actually, the amendment I want to see put out is less coercive than the law currently is. The amendment would only require metric printing, while the current law requires both English and metric printing. You are putting extra regulations on companies, the most international of whom want to be rid of the burden of English units.

To truly learn metric, children need to encounter metric in their everyday life. Just teaching the metric system at school is not enough. Every aspect of their lives must be metricated. When you do this, the children get used to the units and learn them on an intuitive level. Continue to deprive them of that by not moving to all-metric is what keeps this country so far behind, and it's all based on the irrational fear that adult Americans will be helpless were we to move to all-metric labeling.

Sad.


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Last edited by beneficii on 17 Aug 2014, 6:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.

beneficii
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17 Aug 2014, 5:34 pm

Raptor wrote:
I've always thought we should go completely to metrics for science, technology, and industry. Right now we actually use both and that can be confusing.


Yay! We agree on something! :D


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zer0netgain
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20 Aug 2014, 5:17 am

IIRC, it took decades for Europe to make the switch. You really need a whole generation to die off before the old system isn't being used anymore.

A big issue will be cooking. There's no easy way to convert all those recipes to metric measurements.