this post was submitted on 09 Sep 2025
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(page 2) 50 comments
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"Because we are free men, we will be free to measure liquids in liters and milliliters... but not all liquids, only soda, wine, and alcohol because for milk and paint we will use gallons, pints, and quarts, god willing"

"How many liters are in a gallon, sir?" "Nobody knows."

"Why not use meters and kilometers?" "We sill, soldier. But only in certain unpopular sports like track and swimming."

[–] Angelusz@lemmy.world 4 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

I count a flat 8.

[–] merc@sh.itjust.works 14 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago) (11 children)

My 2 main annoyances with the metric system:

First: The SI unit for mass is the kilogram. That's fucking stupid. A kilogram is 1000 grams, the base unit for something can't be "1000 of this other thing". Because the kilogram is the SI unit for mass, that means that a gram is, by definition, 1/1000th of a kilogram. The stupidity, it burns!

The second one isn't really an issue with the metric system, it's more when people are almost using the metric system then fuck it up, like the "Watt Hour" for measuring energy use. You know, there's already a way of measuring energy use: the "Watt Second", also known as "The Joule"

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[–] nonentity@sh.itjust.works 3 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Metric is used all around the world, but comes from a quarter of it.

[–] hperrin@lemmy.ca 154 points 1 day ago (47 children)

I’m always disappointed that megameter isn't a common word. People will say “one thousand kilometers” instead of just “one megameter”.

[–] Klear@quokk.au 43 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm a fan of light nanosecond, which works out to roughly 30 cm.

[–] markz@suppo.fi 27 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Infinitely cooler than a "foot"

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[–] Tyr_Raidho_Othala@reddthat.com 65 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Make it a gigameter for my 1000 megameter needs

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[–] Mobiuthuselah@mander.xyz 7 points 22 hours ago

I use both in my wood shop. Sometimes it's easier to lay things out in metric or divide numbers, but other times it's easier to remember an imperial number to go make a cut.

[–] MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 day ago (6 children)

All units of measure are abstract.

I like metric because it's structured around an abstract amount. Even something like Celsius is pretty abstract, because the freezing and boiling point of water changes depending on the atmospheric pressure. The measure of a second? Why is a second, 1 second long? Why is it 1/60th of 1/60th of 1/24th of a day? There's other stuff based on seconds too, like Hertz, which is literally "cycles per second"

I like to think about how abstract these things are, because if we were to ever try to communicate with a truly alien race, we couldn't really use numbers, because their base numbering system would be different than ours, their symbols for numbers would be different, their entire understanding of math and how to calculate stuff could be wildly different, possibly because they understand things we do not. We couldn't even say to them to communicate on a specific frequency of EM, because that frequency is based on Hertz, which is based on seconds, which is based on ????? IDFK (neither would they). We base everything we know on the world around us, and that's entirely unique to earth. We make so many assumptions about how things are because we've only ever experienced life on this planet.

The only thing that kind of makes sense is how many days of the year there are, because it's based on solid science about our solar system. It's still unique to earth, but at least it makes sense on a larger scale. Everything else? Who the hell knows. Why is a meter as long as it is? Who defined this? Why? What abstract Earth-based thing was this based on that other societies of individuals would have no point of reference to relate to?

It's wild we've made it this far, to be honest.

Anyways, I kind of got sidetracked... I guess all I'm really trying to say is that metric makes more sense than whatever the USA is doing. Even if it's just as abstract in its conception.

[–] oneofmany@lemmy.world 4 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

...which is based on seconds, which is based on ??? IDFK (neither would they)

"The second, symbol s, is the SI unit of time. It is defined by taking the fixed numerical value of the caesium frequency, Δν~Cs~, the unperturbed ground-state hyperfine transition frequency of the caesium 133 atom, to be 9 192 631 770 when expressed in the unit Hz, which is equal to s−1." https://www.bipm.org/en/si-base-units/second

[–] MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 2 points 15 hours ago (2 children)

I don't think that was the idea when the second was created.

The solar rotation cycle is naturally divided into 365 rotations of Earth (give or take), each daily rotation was divided into 24 segments called hours, each hour was further divided into 60 units called minutes, and each minute was then further divided into 60 units which we call seconds.

In the modern era, we have refined how we measure a second by a very stable natural phenomenon, the emissions of cesium (which we also refer to as an "atomic" clock). But we got there first by dividing one of Earth's rotations by 86400. It just so happens that 9 192 631 770 oscillations from cesium also equals 1/86400th of one rotation of Earth.

Additionally, neither a "second" nor even "one rotation of Earth" would have any meaning to someone who has never been to earth before.

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[–] WolfLink@sh.itjust.works 8 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

their base numbering system would be different than ours, their symbols for numbers would be different, their entire understanding of math and how to calculate stuff could be wildly different

The neat thing about math is it’s built upon universal truths that exist independently of how you describe them. 1+1=2 regardless of how you represent those numbers. Even among humans we have plenty of different ways of describing numbers.

Also, the best thing about science is that physics works the way it does regardless of how you describe it. An atom of hydrogen will always have the same spectral peaks, regardless of what units you describe those peaks in.

It’s these kinds of things we consider when trying to communicate with aliens. Take a look at:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_plaque

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyager_Golden_Record

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message

These messages will probably never be received, even if there is intelligent life out there. But if something intelligent does find these messages, they will probably determine they are artificial, and hopefully manage to decode some of it.

[–] MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 2 points 19 hours ago

See, this is all fascinating for me. I love this stuff.

It's also a good exercise in recognizing the assumptions we make every day. I'm trying to get to a point where I can articulate my thoughts and I don't have to struggle through the curse of knowledge.

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[–] cristo@lemmy.world 7 points 22 hours ago

What about a nautical mile?

[–] kamen@lemmy.world 31 points 1 day ago (22 children)

The only positive thing I see about imperial is that things are easily divisible by 3 and 6, but that's about it. Then again, if doing the same with metric, you're usually fine rounding to the nearest millimetre, and if that isn't accurate enough, it's probably not supposed to be done by hand anyway.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (11 children)

Base 12 is easily divisible by 2, 3, 4, 6 and 12

5,280 ft in a mile is fucking nonsense though

[–] bryndos@fedia.io 2 points 19 hours ago

I think a mile is specified in terms of 'chains' not really feet or yards. Feet and yards are meant for measuring smaller stuff, like the size of a foot, or a courtyard.

The 'chain' was a specific surveyors tool for measuring larger land areas. I imagine defined to be a length of physical chain practically manageable by the surveyor - probably pre-dating optical / triangulation methods before lenses got cheap.

I think an acre was then defined as 10 square chains or something.

But go back in time far enough and different jurisdictions have different lengths of standard chain, so different miles and acres derived from it. But it doesn't really matter because if you were buying land in Scotland, then you'd probably want to use a Scottish surveyor and his big long chain.

The nautical mile is then a whole other kettle of fish.

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[–] Djehngo@lemmy.world 59 points 1 day ago (16 children)

The only metric to imperial conversion I remember is kilometers to miles since it's pretty close to the golden ratio.

Even if you don't remember that the golden ratio is 1.6 and a bit, you can approximate it by using successive terms of the Fibonacci sequence.

1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 ...

So 8 miles is about 13km (actually 12.87)

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[–] Tikiporch@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Me watching a BBC TV show: "The suspect's home is five miles away."

shocked pikachu

[–] bignate31@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

there's a very important video on the measurement rules in the UK, if you haven't seen it: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DNh9z3IzG8t/

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[–] nexguy@lemmy.world 13 points 1 day ago

Just remember God giving you a single grain of sand. "One thou sand".

Not a easy to remember as 5 tomatoes.

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