Why still miles?
in [UK Drivers]
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From: Ian Jackson on 20 Jul 2010 09:09 In message <M_ednVRp0-Y9BNjRnZ2dnUVZ8vsAAAAA(a)brightview.co.uk>, Mortimer <me(a)privacy.net> writes >"Man at B&Q" <manatbandq(a)hotmail.com> wrote in message >news:6b019b56-d212-411f-8daa-29bc19de4b73(a)f6g2000yqa.googlegroups.com... >On Jul 19, 8:56 pm, "Mortimer" <m...(a)privacy.net> wrote: >> "Graham Harrison" <edward.harris...(a)remove.btinternet.com> wrote in >>message >> >> news:ksadnf00LtcDPNnRnZ2dnUVZ8rGdnZ2d(a)bt.com... >> >> > Good God man, you'll want to get rid of the (monetary) Pound next. >> >> No. The pound is now correctly divided into 100 pence. It was a different >> matter when it was divided into 240 pence ie 20 shillings each of 12 >>pence: >> I'm glad we got rid of that. > >> It was much easier to split a restaurant bill. > >�10 bill. Dividing into two, four or five is trivially easy in either >case. Dividing into three is �3.33 or �3 2s 6d. And to arrive at the >latter you have to divide 240 by 3, giving 30d, then do 30 div 12 (=2) >and 30 mod 12 (=6). Dividing by three may be 'trivially easy' but, when I were a lad, the answer would have been �3 6s 8d. But, of course, in those days, we didn't use new-speak phrases like 'trivially easy'. We had to make do with 'easy'. But tell that to the young people of today.... (etc etc). -- Ian
From: Knight of the Road on 20 Jul 2010 13:26 "Scott M" <no_one(a)no_where.net> wrote in message news:i23r88$gb2$1(a)speranza.aioe.org... > > Anyway, in the real world, the imperial system is far more use than > metric. A pint of this, a pound of that, a foot of something are all > easily quantifiable amounts that you'd use day to day. Whereas a ml, a g & > a mm of things are too small and a litre, kg or metre of something is too > big. > I have heard (don't have a citation) that carpenters in Germany use Imperial measurements rather than metric because it is more suited to division.
From: Scott M on 20 Jul 2010 13:58 Knight of the Road wrote: > > "Scott M" <no_one(a)no_where.net> wrote in message > news:i23r88$gb2$1(a)speranza.aioe.org... >> >> Anyway, in the real world, the imperial system is far more use than >> metric. A pint of this, a pound of that, a foot of something are all >> easily quantifiable amounts that you'd use day to day. Whereas a ml, a >> g & a mm of things are too small and a litre, kg or metre of something >> is too big. >> > > I have heard (don't have a citation) that carpenters in Germany use > Imperial measurements rather than metric because it is more suited to > division. I'd love to believe that's true. But the point is valid. People's heights is a good example of this - what use is being 1.46m when you can be multiples on an inch which is ideal for idle differentiation. -- Scott Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?
From: Mike Barnes on 20 Jul 2010 14:27 Scott M <no_one(a)no_where.net>: >Knight of the Road wrote: >> "Scott M" <no_one(a)no_where.net> wrote in message news:i23r88$gb2$1@ >>speranza.aioe.org... >>> >>> Anyway, in the real world, the imperial system is far more use than >>>metric. A pint of this, a pound of that, a foot of something are all >>>easily quantifiable amounts that you'd use day to day. Whereas a ml, >>>a g & a mm of things are too small and a litre, kg or metre of >>>something is too big. >>> >> I have heard (don't have a citation) that carpenters in Germany use >>Imperial measurements rather than metric because it is more suited to >>division. > >I'd love to believe that's true. But the point is valid. People's >heights is a good example of this - what use is being 1.46m when you >can be multiples on an inch which is ideal for idle differentiation. It's true that if idleness is your thing, sticking with the units you know is the way forward. Do you believe that people raised on the metric system find it more difficult than us to differentiate people by height? -- Mike Barnes
From: Knight of the Road on 20 Jul 2010 15:27
"Scott M" <no_one(a)no_where.net> wrote in message news:i24o31$r2p$2(a)speranza.aioe.org... >> I have heard (don't have a citation) that carpenters in Germany use >> Imperial measurements rather than metric because it is more suited to >> division. > > I'd love to believe that's true. But the point is valid. People's heights > is a good example of this - what use is being 1.46m when you can be > multiples on an inch which is ideal for idle differentiation. A quick Google has suggested that the wind pipes on musical organs throughout Europe are still denoted in Imperial measurements because the musical scale is divisible by 8 and metric isn't as readily suited to this. The comment about German carpenters using Imperial measurements was something I heard on Radio 4 many years ago and I don't know if it is true, but have no doubt to disbelieve the speaker. A mile is a far better measurement of length, a thousand paces of a Roman soldier, something we can all visualise. A metre is an artificially contrived measurement, one ten-millionth of the distance between the equator and the North Pole. |