Chafee: Time for the US to complete its transition to the metric system

[MovingTarget]

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/03/politics/lincoln-chafee-metric-system-2016-election/index.html

Honestly, I don't know what to say about Chafee as a candidate, but this does make me pause and think. A move like this is LONG OVERDUE. We did transition some systems from US Imperial to metric a few years back, but the average person still only uses the imperial system. This does cause confusion when it comes to international trade, scientific research, etc. So, what do you think, ATPN?

Is it time for the US to finally go metric?

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

Wow, this shit started when I was in grade school or maybe jr. high at most. And then it just disappeared. I'm not sure, it would change nearly everything that's measured, weighed, etc.

However, it would be ultimately beneficial to do it, just to help in the whole global economy thing.

 

[PieIsAwesome]

Is the government going to pay for new tooling, instrumentation, and related equipment for companies that mainly use the imperial system? Ehhhhh. . .

 

[Fern]

Meh, this was tried many years ago when I was a kid in school.

Many parts and tools etc here are already in metric so I don't see much point in it. Also seems like every food product etc already carries both metric and imperial info.

US businesses long adopted for the international markets(s).

Fern

 

[Humpy]

I guess it just means the U.S. government will transition to the metric system? Sheesh, imagine the number of colossal fuckups that will result from that.

 

[feralkid]

I guess it just means the U.S. government will transition to the metric system? Sheesh, imagine the number of colossal fuckups that will result from that.

Ugh...I don't even want to think about that.

 

[MrPickins]

I feel the US is like someone trying to stop drinking:

"I can switch to metric anytime... Just not right now..."

 

[werepossum]

Now that virtually everything we use is imported, it would surely make things easier to be on one common system.

And may I applaud Chaffee for his courage in running on the Jimmy Carter platform. Not many would.

 

[who?]

The Fahrenheit scale allows for more detail, Celsius is too rough. I believe England has gone back to describing women in inches instead of cm.s. One stone is fourteen pounds, that isn't metric.

 

[MrPickins]

The Fahrenheit scale allows for more detail, Celsius is too rough.

The scale isn't discrete. You can use fractions of a degree. :hmm:

 

[Tsavo]

No way.

We'd have to replace every SAE bolt on everything ever made here with metric hardware.

This would cost trillions.

 

[crashtech]

No way.

We'd have to replace every SAE bolt on everything ever made here with metric hardware.

This would cost trillions.

Huh? It's not like we are going to throw away our tools, just simplifying everything moving forward. Lots of stuff is metric. I have metric tape measures and use millimeters often for certain things, the arithmetic is a lot easier and there is less chance of error.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

You want to sell the metric system to the American people? Tell them that they're not some 300 pound fatass, they're a scant 136 kilos. No, you don't have a small 5 inch penis, that thing is damn near 13 centimeters. The metric system is the vanity sizing of the measurements.

 

[trenchfoot]

As a retired toolmaker who now works as a machinist, I'd very much appreciate moving over to metric, as more than half the jobs that come in the shop are metric oriented as are the blueprints that get handed out as shop projects. In my trade, metric measuring carries a finer resolution than inch and that helps a lot when machining close tolerance parts.

And most auto mechanics I know already have complete metric and SAE tool sets. In fact, just having to do my own tune ups, maintenance and mechanical repairs on the family cars requires me to have complete sets of metric and SAE tools in my tool chest at home.

So as far as I'm concerned, I'm already there.

 

[Darwin333]

I remember when they started talking about that back in the 80's while I was in grade school. It lasted two years or so and then like a child bored with a toy they said fuck that commie metric system shit.

The metric system makes way more sense and is vastly superior to our retarded ass imperial system but we like being unique. Ok, the unique part is me being an optimist so I'm willing to concede that the masses are just to friggen dumb.

 

[Darwin333]

The Fahrenheit scale allows for more detail, Celsius is too rough. I believe England has gone back to describing women in inches instead of cm.s. One stone is fourteen pounds, that isn't metric.

Umm, they use this new fangled thing called a decimal point. It actually works quite well once you figure out their (evidently) great complexity.

 

[trenchfoot]

The imperial measuring system reminds me of why our english keyboards are arranged the way they are.

If I recall correctly, back in the day when typewriters had these long arms with character symbols on the tips that needed to be struck against paper to write with, many skilled users typed so fast so as to jam those arms together into major cluster f**ks.

As a way to avoid that from happening, the typewriter manufacturers scrambled up the keyboard arrangement so that it forcibly slowed down the operators ability to type. Ergo, our present day keyboard arrangement that never got changed because, well, simply because.

 

[Texashiker]

Rest of the world needs to piss off and get over its metric system.

 

[Darwin333]

No way.

We'd have to replace every SAE bolt on everything ever made here with metric hardware.

This would cost trillions.

The idea is that hopefully our children won't require two sets of wrenches because we (and pretty much just us) decide we want to be different in a spectacularly dumb way. I'm even seeing architects having to make two sets of architectural prints so that those of us that need the greater detail have it and those that can't figure out the metric system and don't need the detail can still bid the project.

While I can do the math, adding 1 5/8" + 2 2/3" + 3 3/32" is overly complicated versus adding 52mm + 67.5mm + 79.6mm.

Pop quiz, no calculators allowed, how many inches are in 500 feet? How many meters in 500 kilometers? Is it easier to add fractions in your head or decimal points? I bet half of Americans can't tell you how many pints and quarts are in 2 gallons off the top of their heads. Yet I barely even need to think about a "harder" conversion like how to convert 2.4593 liters to even a very small unit like milliliters. To the 4th decimal point, how many ounces, quarts and pints in 2.4593 gallons? Anyone that says they can do the imperial math above without a calculator is either in the top .1% mathematically or is a liar.

 

[StinkyPinky]

The Fahrenheit scale allows for more detail, Celsius is too rough. I believe England has gone back to describing women in inches instead of cm.s. One stone is fourteen pounds, that isn't metric.

What the.....you can say 26.5 degrees C if you want. THere's no law it has to be a full value. But for every day people, 26 C is accurate enough and it just makes sense. 0 is freezing, 100 is boiling.

As for England, yes, they aren't fully metric either despite people thinking it is. They use miles for distances for example

 

[stormkroe]

I always wonder why people have to be 'either/or'ers. Things work great with both. Even Canadia tried going pure metric in the late 70s and it was a disaster. Houses are built in inches, no reason at all to impose the costs of changing over to metric.
Both is great, just don't get your chocolate on my peanut butter.

 

[Indus]

kilo: The kilogram (abbreviation, kg) is the Standard International (SI) System of Units unit of mass. It is defined as the mass of a particular international prototype made of platinum-iridium and kept at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures.

meter: The basic unit of length in the metric system; it was originally planned so that the circumference of the Earth would be measured at about forty million meters. A meter is 39.37 inches. Today, the meter is defined to be the distance light travels in 1 / 299,792,458 seconds.

litre: A metric unit of capacity, formerly defined as the volume of one kilogram of water under standard conditions, now equal to 1,000 cubic centimetres (about 1.75 pints): [ as modifier ] : a litre bottle of wine. In an irrigated area, a litre of milk takes at least 500 litres of water to produce.

Whatever we do, lets not have another http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider incident over it.

 

[MovingTarget]

The Fahrenheit scale allows for more detail, Celsius is too rough. I believe England has gone back to describing women in inches instead of cm.s. One stone is fourteen pounds, that isn't metric.

I get the whole issue with having a more detailed scale. Some are more sensitive to temperature than others. I personally prefer the Fahrenheit scale when looking at the week's weather forecast, but acknowledge the superiority of Celsius when actually trying to CREATE the weather report. To our children/grandchildren, it would be just as natural for them to use metric if we get on board already. If we had done so when the first requests came about, in the 1920s, this wouldn't be an issue.

But yeah, I get it:

 

[Darwin333]

Rest of the world needs to piss off and get over its metric system.

Damn right! Everyone should conform to our shittier system because we aren't smart enough to figure out the far superior and easier to use system. Murica bitches!!

 

[master_shake_]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7x-RGfd0Yk

makes complete sense.