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this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2023
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Yeah. Because it’s a shitty system.
Except it’s not.
People will either say „half a kilometre“ or „500 meters“, because that’s something you can actually easily calculate …
And your GPS will tell you „turn left in 100/200/etc m“, or and not „in a quarter of a mile“…
No... Actually, the person you're talking to is correct. We switch back and forth in metric all the time, fluidly, because it's easy. The things you're describing and many more are normal parts of the metric system, and your flat assumption that it never happens because you assume it's too hard and unnatural is kind of a solid demonstration of how metric is superior.
Buddy. Take the L. You know how there's the popular saying: if you think everyone else is an arsehole, it's probably you. The anology here being you think everyone is else is blind, when it's you.
No one is suggesting not to use base 8 and 16 in computing because those are appropriate for thei use-cases.
If the imperial system was internally consistent it would be just as great as metric. A fully dozenal system would be dope! So many fractions (for real, that'd be sick. Microfeet, 1/(12⁶) of an ft, or 10-⁶ ft in base 12, sign me up. Take a ft³ relate that to a unit of volume and mass via water..... Wait this is just metric but base 12). But it isn't, So take the L.
Metric is objectively (removing things that are just preference) better or the same in every, single, way. It's entertaining for you to try find examples, so please, continue.
"In metric, one milliliter of water occupies one cubic centimeter, weighs one gram, and requires one calorie of energy to heat up by one degree centigrade—which is 1 percent of the difference between its freezing point and its boiling point. An amount of hydrogen weighing the same amount has exactly one mole of atoms in it. Whereas in the American system, the answer to ‘How much energy does it take to boil a room-temperature gallon of water?’ is ‘Go fuck yourself,’ because you can’t directly relate any of those quantities." Josh Bazell
WE ABSOULTELY DO MIX UNITS LIKE THAT. You just don't because it's too hard, or don't work in an industry where you have to. For you, yes, imperial is juuuuust fine. And it is fine. It works, okay. But it just is worse.
It's silly to judge a measurement system solely by "everyday use", because these measurements are for everything, not just you walking around, or reading about the weather. They need to be suitable for all scales, all industries, all locations. 1 system of identical units. Conversion errors are serious business across history and today.
Every conversion is a risk of error, and you're just adding more sources of it in imperial because a mental sanity check after using a calculator is harder when it's not base 10. (Our numbers are base 10, unless you want to change our international number system too, then base 10 is best for a system of measurement, full stop)
I'm going to use random numbers as examples, because in the real world, not everything ends up being nice numbers.
This is just a single example of how for design, metric conversion is useful. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it holds true everywhere.
Construction, for example, in most industries use mm, including houses, because it means you can just put a number and it will never be confused for anything else (lower chance of error). Building plans, will literally have 21,578 as a total length on them if you have a large building, pipe, whatever. I immediately know it's 21.578 m, which is useful conceptually, and all the smaller lengths shown are also immediately understood without having to show the unit on the drawing, I can happily have a room 3500 wide and the whole building length on the same drawing, and usually no decimals because 1mm is precise enoi 1ugh. It's all round mm. No chance to mess up or cram the drawing full of units.
Yes, in an imperial plan you can have a single unit, but what? 1000ths of an inch? Barley corns? 26,808 is how many feet with decimals or remainder fractions? Lemme get the calculator... Slowing down work on the worksite or design office and leading to errors. Or you'll use inches, and then need to use fractional inches for things smaller than an inch (frequent in most construction) Or feet. What's 3/8 if an inch in feet? Oh easy! 3/8 × 12 = 36/8 = 4.5... and that's an easy one. What's 267 5/16 inches in feet? Better grab the calculator. You can develop a sense of roughly how big, but not exactly because...
We use base 10 numbers. This is objectively harder. It's not what's "easier" for people to use. We don't use base 12. The above would be great in base 12. (I use X and E for 10 and 11) 1X3.39 inches = 1X.339 feet. Booyah. (Or base the whole thing on feet with prefixes every 10³ (every 12³ base 10).
In such a beautiful duodecimal system, all the benefits would be the same as for metric. But we don't use base 12 and neither do you.
The phonecians did stuff, good for them. Hell, the US has done a lot of stuff with imperial units, good for you. Imperial isn't confusing. It's just harder to mentally calculate quickly and accurately (objectively, again, we use base 10. You use base 10, this isn't up for debate).
Why is this important when we have calculators? For checking. I don't work in building construction, in piping being able to check design drawings quickly and accurately is sooo important, and made so much easier when really long and really short lengths are all in 1 unit. Not 3 (yes pipes need that difference in scale).
Pls