h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I am delighted that EU has decided that it isn't worth pushing the UK to adopt a wholly metric system, and that they will allow the current muddle to continue indefinitely.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6637587.stm

Now don't get me wrong: I have nothing against the metric system. In fact I admire its elegance and simplicity; the way that it uses our finger-based base 10 counting system, and also the way that the units interact and are related to one another. It's top stuff. It's also the system that I was wholly educated in - a pound and an ounce or an inch and a foot were never mentioned in my classroom ever.

Unfortunately whilst I was happily learning about all these centimetres and stuff, the rest of my world wasn't. Therefore when I look at the world I consider myself to 6 foot tall and weighing sixteen stone. I live a mile from the beach, on the way there I'd buy an ounce of tobacco and then a pint of milk on the way back to make a nice cup of tea.

When I was a kid the park that I played in was 3 acres. In the garden my Grandad and I used to lift spuds from the ground by the hundredweight. I wasn't so bothered about the chain length of a cricket pitch, but I was about the 18 yard box in football. And when he had a bet, as he often did, my Grandad's horse almost used to lose in the last furlong.

Thinking about it, the only 2 places where I use a metric unit is, one, in buying petrol - that just goes in a tank, so you never see it so it might as well be in litres as in gallons. Then A4 paper, which as you all know is one-sixteenth of a square metre with the aspect ratio of 1 to the square-root of 2.

A victory for that oh-so-elusive thing...

er... whatdaya call it...

ah, common sense, that's it.


It always was completely ridiculous to criminalise people for such a triviality.

Oh, I forgot swimming: that's in metres and always has been. The pool where I trained - salt water outdoor pool in Minehead - was laid out in metres when it was first built back in the 1930s - 50 metre lengths, 10 metre diving stage and a 3 metre springboard

Metric versus imperial is really rather odd... Like you I were taught naught but metric at school.... And found everything outside school was imperial I still do peoples height, and weight in imperial distances in miles but I'm pretty happy buying 500 G of cheese though I do do a kinda quick mental thinking thing along the lines of '250 G cheese, about half a pound... 500 G bit over a pound'... But I'm definately millimetres when it comes to small scale measurements, or measuring for buying, E.G., a unit to fit in a given space in the house The half-arsed attempt at metric in this country is good... its very British.... its... weird Hmm... and tobacco like canibis comes in imperial measurements

I do that half and half thing where consumables are grams and kilograms (except beer and milk), distances and heights are Imperial and most things are just ignored. The fact that so many people were taught in only metric then introduced to a big wide Imperial world is baffling...

I'm slightly surprised that the EU really was going to outlaw imperial measurements. It sounds just like the usual tabloid scare stories.

I was buying timber in metric lengths in the early to mid 80s. In London. Ain't nowt wrong wi' it. But if you're *really* scared of metric, move to America. It'll be the last country to succumb.

What completely blew my mind, and puzzled me to no end, was the realization about a year or two ago that the American "standard" and British "imperial" systems were actually *different*. Here I was, thinking a gallon was a gallon... that was scary. One of the best reasons for switching that I can think of.

I'm so annoyed! Of course my mum is happy because it's been 60 years since she learnt pounds and ounces, and she feels she's too old to learn anything again.

I'm annoyed because I don't understand imperial hardly at all these days. Once J was born, everything was measured in metric, and then I made friends with someone from Ukraine and that was all metric too so I 'switched' over. She frowned and told me off if I gave her measurements in imperial. Obviously studying technology I also use metric there, so am even learning to measure distance in km instead of miles.

What really annoys me is that J's stupid dad has taught him imperial, so he also now says 'what's that in stones?' when he's weighed at the doctors, while I'm asking for kilos. Then the doctor gives me his height in feet and inches, while I'm asking for cms and she has to go back outside to the measuring thingy to look again. You can't buy clothes in feet and inches!

When I went into my local butchers and asked for kilos he pulled a face and wanted imperial. I'm fed up with getting recipes and having to take ages converting them to the sizes I see on tins and packets in the supermarket, then have to convert back again for one bloody shop.

It's just a flicking nuisance and they need to sort it out once and for all. Are we imperial, which is ridiculous - different ounces in a pound to pounds in a stone, then American pounds are different and they use 'cups' and we're not like Europe either, or are we metric?? Make up your flicking mind!

Ooh, I get so baity about this. We need to just SWITCH TO ONE OR THE OTHER (preferably metric)!

Great so my PB for the mile 3:56:67 run on a 400m track will still stand.

Cross Countries in this country will still be run in miles and there will still be 42km markers and 26 mile markers on UK Marathon courses and people can still hit the wall after 20 miles rather 32 kms.

Doesn't the length of a Marathon run look much better in metric, too?

26 miles 385 yards against 42km 195 metres. Nope the metric version doesn't have the history of the extra being added to that the London Olympic Marathon of 1908 started inside Windsor Castle so taht King Edward VI, who was ill could see the start from inside rather than out. You'd lose all that.

"We need to just SWITCH TO ONE OR THE OTHER"

Except in a few cases (pints in pubs, for example) metric is compulsory on goods. Listing another measurement, whether it's pounds, inches, gallons, shekels, cubits or whatever, shouldn't confuse you. I get what you mean with heights and weights, though.

"Except in a few cases (pints in pubs, for example)"

My local lets regular customers bring in their own mugs. Mine is in metric (50cl). The bartender just fills it closer to the top to make up the difference between that and a 20 oz. pint.

Now here's a little fact that I only found out today. Jams and honey have to be sold by Imperial weight. They're marked up in grammes, but the weight unit has to be imperial - 454g, 340g for 1lb and 12oz etc.

How sweet is that

i've got one better... working on the corvette project some years back, i saw the GM engineers had done all the drawings in metric (as per longstanding procedure apparently)...

but when you see a measurement like 43.5483mm +/-0.0918mm you now they're really doing it in thousandths of inches(there's a particularly half-fish-half-fowl idea for you, the 1/1000 inch...) and just faking the metrics.

Speaking of which, I'm having a heck of a time locating a metric fine thread stainless bolt for my bike. I stopped at a shop, Mainland Bolt, and the man behind the counter said I can't get them in the size I need. At least not in stainless. So I looked on-line this morning... he may be correct. I'll be doing more searching later as I need to get the exact dimensions but a quick search did show I couldn't get any size metric/fine thread in stainless from the first supplier I found.


I'm sure they exist but finding a domestic supplier may be a trick.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/17/Metric_system.png/800px-Metric_system.png
Countries in red have yet to adopt the metric system.

What was it Grandpa Simpson said? "The metric system is the tool of the devil! My car gets forty rods to the hogshead and that's the way I like it!"

That's just brilliant... both the map and the quote.