Posted on 05/07/2026 5:51:42 PM PDT by DoodleBob
…Most other nations dutifully adopted SI, changing road signs and packaging and teaching the metric system in schools. Even the United Kingdom, which had lagged for years, mostly embraced the system in an effort to keep pace with other European Union nations. (Since the U.K. left the EU, metric opponents there have argued the nation should stop using metric units, a controversial proposition that has yet to be adopted.)
Despite international adoption and increasing federal policy encouraging the use of metric units, the U.S. continued to drag its feet. Resistance was fueled in part by industrialists who argued the system was too complicated and expensive to implement, legislators suspicious of “foreign” influence, and controversies over whether wide-scale federal adoption might infringe on states’ rights.
The end result was confusion. Though the U.S. officially declared SI the nation’s preferred system through the 1975 Metric Conversion Act, even federal agencies were slow to adopt metric in industry, education, commerce, and daily life. One example is road signs: Though federal officials attempted to turn a new interstate in Arizona into an SI poster child in the wake of the Metric Conversion Act, even giving it kilometer markers instead of mileposts, transportation officials never extended metric-only signage to the remainder of the federal highway system.
…
Nonetheless, Benham still believes voluntary metrification in the U.S. is possible—and encourages individuals to look for the metric measurements that already surround them…
Ultimately, says Benham, a full transition to the metric system won’t be possible until individuals take the plunge and decide to use it in their daily lives. That’s why she focuses on education at her job—and has switched to the metric system in her daily life, setting her smartphone to measure length in kilometers instead of miles and using degrees Celsius instead of Fahrenheit.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalgeographic.com ...
I can deal with miles and kilometers, and I can handle kilograms and pounds, etc.
I prefer what I grew up with. If a cop stops me and asks, “Do you know how fast you were going, sir,” I’m not going to answer in kph. If I’m asked what I weigh, I’m not coming back with kgs.
If it’s hard, though, (really big or really small numbers, for instance), I might use my iPhone, my brand new iPad Pro, or my MacBook Pro to help out to save a tree.
Beyond that, I just pretend to be too old to f*** with it.
I don’t know your age, but I’ll bet you have 75% of an E6B’s functionality working all the time in you head.
Hey Joe, got one of them 19/32nds wrenches in yer back pocket?
= = =
I think I do have a 19/32nds open end wrench.
I also do not think I have ever used it (on a bolt, anyway).
What was that size used for????
5.0 ml is one teaspoon, 15.0 ml is a Tablespoon.
Yes. But the bagels are bigger because kilograms are bigger than pounds.
The Fahrenheit 0 is the freezing point of seawater, not distilled water. It is also, as I noted, a finer scale. In fact, one degree difference in Fahrenheit is almost exactly the difference that you can stick your finger into two cups of warm water and tell that one is warmer than the other.
If Fahrenheit weren’t tied to the imperial system, it might be touted as better than Celsius.
All that said, I use them both more or less interchangeably
Sure. Or a toggle switch for one or the other.
I get it, Youre making a point about driving in Canada. Saying I could use the kph setting.
They would probably round it to the nearest metre just like they do with yards.
The founders just used the system they inherited from their British colonial masters. How patriotic is that?
Celsius was chosen over Fahrenheit because it was easier to calibrate the thermometers.
“But it was originally 1/10,000,000 of the distance from the equator to the north pole through Paris and was HORRIBLY in error for decades.”
The Frogs did it, of course. At least we didn’t get stuck with their crazy calendar.
My slide rule is made in Denmark. It’s in the form of a small tumbler—about four deciliters in volume.
While not accurate, I regard the mention of a centimeter as being about one half-inch.
A drop/rise of ONE Celsius degree makes a bigger difference in comfort.
But we shouldn’t bring back Britain’s measure of “British Standard” or Whitworth.
“Metric is superior.”
Then apply it to the clock.
While we make our list of items to scrap, daylight savings time goes to the top.
The metric is system is kinda’ like the military time system.
Very simple to learn but people are just too darn intellectually lazy and stubborn to do it.
Yeah, for people that can’t do fractions, enjoy sports that routinely end in 1-1 ties, and who have never put a man on the moon.
That and certain running distances (800m, 5k, 10k, etc.).
You get used to it.
One good reason not to convert to metric: can you imagine how much it would cost to replace all the highway signs and street signs all over our country? It didn’t cost European countries that much to change their signs. Their countries are a lot smaller.
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