The A4 format is awesome. Fold the A4 sheet in half and you get A5. Fold it again and you get A6. Double the A4 format and you get A3, double again and you get A2, double and you get A1, double and you get A0. But all formats have the same length to width ratio. French and German scientists searched for the perfect format for a long time and then found it.
@@TunaBear64 i wondered where exactly that format came from since length measures aren't round at any point, but if A0 is really precisely 1m2 then that makes aperfect sense. It would als mean that each consequent format would be 1/2^(format number)m2 So like A1 = 1/2m2, A2 = 1/4m2, A3 = 1/8m2 etc. So nice!
You missed the one of the most important ISO Papier features A0 is exactly 1m2 big. So A1 is 1/2, A2 is 1/4 etc. it makes way easier to design posters, count prices and switch sizes - once designed, it fits all sizes
The formula for An papers is simple : let A0 = 1 m^2, m is meter (i see u fellas in the state) the Formula : An = A0/(2^n) such as n€|N (integer). Basically : A1 =A0/2^1=A0/2 A4 = A0/2^4 = A0/16 Conclusion : An is a sequence that can be infinitely small to reach 0 if n is infinitely large to reach infinity (limits notion) and vice versa.... Means the more n is bigger the smaller the paper is....
Not exactly, an A0 is 1m² indeed, but the sides are _cut_ to integer millimeters [“cut” vs “round”: you cut the non-integer part, 1.9 rounded is 2, 1.9 cut is 1], which gives you 1189×841mm; to get to the next smaller format, you cut it in half, but again _cut_ to integer millimeters, which gives you the sequence of 1189 → _841_ → 594 → _420_ → 297 → _210_ → 148 → _105_ - remember that, and you remember all the paper sizes from A0 to A6.
If this fractionalization is so important, then why isn't it important in length measures? Metric (base 10, actually) is evenly divisible by 1, 2, and 5. On the other hand, 12 is divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6. 16 is divisible by 1, 2, 4, 6, and 8. Base 10 is a mistake. Base 12 or 16 is a more convenient everyday measure.
It's not just the military. The majority of the technical industries of the U.S. live in metric and convert when needed. During my time as an automotive engineer, that's how we did it anyway. Also, fun fact: tires sizes are an interesting combination of measurements. If a tire is 225/50R17. That means it's 225 millimeters wide, 17-inches in diameter with a 50 percent as wide sidewall to tire width ratio.
Not only that. Legally the US Imperial measurements are now defined in metric ones. Or who knows really. The point is that a Inch or whatever is not 'almost' or 'close enough' 2.54cm. Not a lawyer or anything. Yet a Inch is by all meanings of the words exactly 2.54cm. Looking it up quickly on the Googles. Since 1959 the inch has been defined officially as 2.54 cm. It really makes it quite clear that the imperial measurements have changed ever so slightly to be based legally and realistically on metric. It is less accurate to use Pi in everyday math then convert Inches to CM. Since Inches ARE now CM's. If so a very pointless and awkward unit. We got DPI. PPI. Dots Per Inch. Pixels Per Inch. So even in the world of A4's and complete Metric tech? Inches are here to keep making things painful. 600 DPI = 236,220472441 Dots Per cm. Simply perfect!
17" wheel diameter to clarify. The outer diameter would be (225 mm * 2(0.50) /25.4) + 17" = 25.86". Then some light truck tires don't use metric at all. Just 31x10.50 R15.
I saw on old WWII movie where Americans were approaching Paris and the sign was in km. One soldier asked another, "How many miles is that?". The 2nd said, "You multiply by 5, divide by 8 and subtract 1." The first said, "Why subtract 1?". The 2nd replied, "Because that's how far we'll have gone before you figure it out!"
@@dcinpa1134 5/8 is exactly what that movie example used. it is quite accurate, considering how far after the coma anything that is not a 0 shows up when you show the length of a mile in km.
@@PaulVincent-n2x One TERRESTRIAL mile is 1609 meters. One NAUTICAL mile is 1852 meters. Madness, I say. Madness. Give me metric any day - I just have to play with the comma.
I think the point is immobilism ( resistance to change ) - About the 190 countries have switched to SI at some point in the last 2 centuries. - In 2001, most European countries have switched from their traditional currencies to Euro. - In 1967, Sweden has switched from left to right hand driving ( no more traffic collisions than the previous weeks ). All those changes need a personal effort of adaptation. A few days to figure out how expensive a thing is in Euro, a few weeks for elders. ...
Sweden made the change from driving on the left hand side of road as it was possible to drive directly to Norway where they drove on right hand side of road, other countries on mainland Europe also drove on right. United Kingdom and Ireland drive on left hand side of road, to reach any other country you must use a ferry or rail through tunnels.
@Brian3989 Sweden had referendum to ask the people if they wanted to change to travel on the same side as the rest of Europe, the Swedish people said no to the change, people don't like change. But a few years later, the gov decided to make the change anyway, I guess this decision made sense.
There are economic reasons for the Euro & switching sides of the road (right handed cars are more plentiful than left handed, so tend to be cheaper to get ahold of). There is no economic reason to push for the US to change measuring systems and a lot of economic reasons not to. Would it be easier for me if we were on the metric? Probably....I wouldn't need half the sockets & wrenches in my toolbox, but that's a sunk cost at this point. We science in metric. We live life in Imperial. It's really not a big deal. Cherish diversity.
@@joeldumas5861 if you actually do your homework, you will see that Europe was a complete mishmash of measurements of all kinds that you haven’t even heard of anymore! They had to standardize in order to be able to sell to each other and that pressure resulted in the invention of the metric system. There was never such a problem on the American continent! They had imported the imperial system and used it all over without any variance! So the logic is: why mess with something that isn’t broken? And your answer is plain as day! It is still being used, and shows no sign of fading away!
Both Imperial and Metric get taught in US schools and in engineering at universities Metric is probably used more predominantly (but in industry is different matter). In terms of things that people care about on a personal level, the 12 inch foot is a more pragmatic unit than 10 centimeters. People are used to buying gasoline priced by the gallon and get perplexed when buying by the liter on trips to Canada. Same when buying a pound of steak vs steak by the kilogram (or grams). Is what people are used to and have no compulsion to change because there’s no significant advantage (one that matters). No one in US is concerned or cares about what people in other countries chose to do. If a US manufacturer needs to produce a product in Metric to suit external markets then fine - all engineers in US are entirely familiar with working with Metric. The US domestic market is rather large and so there is huge momentum to continue making products to what is desired by its inhabitants. And other countries don’t have any difficulty selling Metric products in US as Metric tools are super readily available everywhere. At the end of the day we want our gasoline in gallons, our steak by the pound, our road distances by miles, and our land parcels by acres - has been our system since the nation’s foundation and there is no good reason to deviate away from that.
In the US all prepackaged food and most other things are similarly labeled with both Imperial and Metric as well. Now we just need to do the second part, and phase out the Imperial system.
That's not the way I remember it and it would be setting yourself up for failure. When Australia converted to metric in the 1970s rulers and tapes in both measures were banned. Also, the author of this video seems to imagine that centimetres are a normal part of the modern metric system. This is not so. It was true in the old CGS (centimetres gramme second) system but this was superseded by the SI system in the 1930s. Now the preferred units progress in 1000s.viz: millimetres-metres-kilometres, millilitres- litres -kilolitres and grams- kilograms- tonnes. The centimetres is not a preferred unit for most purposes in the SI system.
It involved a bit more than that. For example milk used to be sold by the pint (568 ml) now had to be sold as a quarter, half litre or litre measures. Similarly with packaged dry goods (flour, sugar etc) was standardised to half kilo or kilo packaging - not 450 or 900 gms. Butter etc is sold in 250 gms or 500 gms pockaging, not the old imperial sizes. This affected all pre-packaged goods - except for canned goods!
I think you are confusing things a bit. The metric system is set up as a 10^n system and it depends on what you are measuring. The main ones are 10^3n, but that doesn't mean 10^2, also known as centi (hundredth), isn't a normal part of the metric system. He showed it quite well in the video. It all depends on the scale, you can measure a few meter long stuff in millimeters, if you want, but the question is how precise of a measurement you need. Sometimes centimeters are good enough, so you would use them.
@@drsfsmith1603 say what you will but centimeters is what everybody uses in real life no matter what the SI units dictate, because it is a more relatable number! Nobody actually measures in millimeters!
American here. We were taught the metric system in school in the 70s and 80s, along with the Imperial system, for the big switchover that never happened. Yet we still use both. Any man with a toolbox will have both metric and imperial wrenches and sockets although the ratchets will be in imperial, 1/4", 3/8", 1/2", etc... Also truck drivers will use the 24 hour clock, keeping their logs on their home terminals time zone with appointments on the shipper or receivers time zone. I find myself constantly doing quick conversions in my head between the two and between decimals and fractions. We just use both.
Paul, I have a serious question for you (or perhaps just an observation). Americans seem to have no problem measuring their guns, calibres exclusively in millimetres these days. You also seem fine expressing the engine capacity of your cars exclusively in litres/millilitres. I mean, guns and cars are about as American as it gets. Also, you (not you personally) only buy and sell cocaine in grams and kilograms with no interference or legislation to do so, so your black market has long since converted to metric all by itself. My question is not about your reluctance to use the metric system, but rather: If you tell me you weigh 175lbs, I, a Brit, who has always used imperial to express my weight, have no immediate idea how big you are. I would need to do some maths first. The reason is, I would express your weight as 12 stone 7lbs or simply twelve and a half stones. (1 stone = 14lbs). Likewise, if I tell an American I weigh 12st 7lbs, they look at me like I'm speaking nonsense or I've just set them homework. The thing is, if you asked my height I wouldn't say "I'm 76 inches tall" and expect you to divide 76 by 12 then work out the remainder to get 6'4". Luckily we both kept the foot as a unit of length, so we both have an instant idea of how tall 6'4" is, and no idea how tall 76 inches is. Why then did America not keep the stone? And why act like WE are ridiculous for continuing to use it when you have ditched it and only use the smaller lb? I have heard Americans scoff at the stone as a unit, because "it sounds silly and stones are not all the same size", seemingly oblivious to the fact that feet are also fairly odd things and not all the same size. Cheers.
@@nericsso only tires (or to be exact the rims) are still measured in inches, even in Europe. They are always complaining about Europe not buying enough of what they produce for their liking (Have they ever checked their prices compared to the rest of the market?) If any of those items would still be in imperial sizes, fasteners etc. only, no one would buy anything of that. Best example american cars (although almost no one in euroe imports those) they use nuts and bolts mainly in metric sizes. Worst example, some cars of a certain age, they use a wild mix of both units fasteners...
@@emdiar6588 you know what is even more ridiculous? look up how they measures for length are defined. an inch is 1/12 of a foot. a yard is 3 foot, a mile is 5280 fot or 1750 yards. But search the NIST documents that define how long a foot is. It is legally defined as exact 0.3048 meter (since I think 1959, before it was a little more due to some weird 1200/something of a meter value since 1793 or so.) Volumes on the other hand to my knowledge are derived from cubic inches, with a gallon being like 231 cubic inches. a quart is, surprise, a quart of a gallon, a pint is half a quart, or 16 ounces... the omnipresent kitchen units on the other hand are something completely different. So by definition they are using units which are a conversion from a metric defined length.
You haven't talked about the whole purpose of SI units. The fact that all units are directly related to one another, so any form of scientific or engineering calculation is very simple and straightforward.
No, SI units are not all related to one another, in the way that Metric units are all related to one another. The "second" is an S.I. unit, but it is a legacy unit. Its value is not derived from le mètre, but is simply the value (more or less) that it has always had since long before the Metric System was conceived.
@@GH-oi2jf Dude, the SI (Systeme Internationale) IS the metric system. And a second is defined as: the time a Cesium 133 atom vibrates 9 192 631 770 times, or similar. A derived unit for sure, but readily definable, and fixed.
@@GH-oi2jf The metre was originally derived from the second as the length of a pendulum that swings once per second, as you might find in for example a grandfather clock. It is now derived from it via the speed of light.
@@katrinabryce at 299,997,... meters per second. why didn't they go all the way and make it an even 300,000,000? such a tiny difference. In a word, all measurement systems are arbitrary, even SI, Look at the conversion between the Watt/second and the Calorie, both SI measurements for the same thing. though that has been replaced by the Joule more recently
As an American living in the UK, the system here seems to make the least sense lol. You drive in mph, but fill your car up in liters. Things are measured in kilos, but people are usually in stone (a multiple of pounds) or sometimes lbs. Most people measure their height in feet and inches, but some people use centimeters (there is overlap, a number of people know their height in both). Celsius for temperature. Pints for beer, drink cups and the like (although the British pint is meant to be more in line with metric and thus is bigger than an American pint). Google Maps offers you the choice of showing a distance in miles or km, but most people use miles in my experience (unless you're talking about races, then it's almost always km). Most small things are weighed in grams and mL, but cookbooks have all the various imperial measurements like tablespoons and pounds, likewise you can buy cooking utensils with both systems on them. Typical bottled drinks come in liters/mL. Things are usually measured in cm/m for home improvement stuff, but you do get inches and feet occasionally and they come on the tape measures. House/room sizes are measured in square feet, but usually you get the meter conversion as well. Long story short, it's a bit of a confusing mess 😆
@@generaledelogu1892 yeah, well, we did kind of invent the, ahem, Imperial measurement system, and only started using metric measurements in the mid 1970's to try and get into the European Common Market for some tax breaks. Metric wasn't legally required for sales of stuff by weight until the 1980's. Being born in 1970 I was the first generation to be bought up thinking in Imperial, but working in metric. Made life easier when I was working as a building surveyor in 1990. Millimetres are easier to judge and work in than hundredths and thou's of an inch! Lol
I'm guessing, but I suspect the mess was caused by government mandates. In the United States, we encouraged conversion for a time, but without mandates. Some gasoline companies tried selling gasoline by the liter, but that didn't last long, so now the US gallon is the unit everywhere. If the UK forced general conversion to liters of petrol, then of course you are stuck with it. Even if you removed the mandate, the companies would not want to change all their pumps back. The question is, why aren't road distances marked in km?
@@GH-oi2jf the only government mandate is that goods must be priced in metric, although there is no mandate saying goods cannot be sold by imperial weight, and for many years petrol was advertised in cost per gallon, as well as in litres, and food stuffs were priced on pounds and ounces as well as kilogrammes and grams. Some older family run businesses such as butchers still do this. Although most supermarkets have dropped the imperial measures these days.
the problem with inches, pounds, yards, feet and so on is that almost every significant country has their own definition of it. For example a swedish inch is not the same as a danish one or a scottish one, or a english one and so on.
Norway here: The map about floor numbering is a bit off. Some commercial buidings use O or U (for utgang, exit or other variants), but "ground floor" is "first floor" in all homes and houses. We even lack a word for "ground floor".
I noticed that for Iceland, who more or less use the American system (was very confusing for me as a Central European when we were on vacation there). Interesting that it’s the case in Norway too.
In the UK the same thing happens. Basically if your building has 2 floors it'd really just be the 1st floor as the ground floor & the 2nd floor for the upstairs. In a house it'd be upstairs & downstairs (I have no idea what it'd be if you had 3 floors in a house)
In Canada we use both systems also! Here's a non exhaustiv breakdown. Temperature outside: c Pool or oven temperature: f Distance: km (or time) Distance on water: nautical miles (Miles are uses by older folks or in fixed idioms otherwise) Your Height: feet and inches You weight: lbs Smaller things such as fruits: kg Measuring smaller or objects: inches Liquids: liters (such as water bottles and everything really) And gallons are used for gas canisters or tanks (such as a tank that holds 100 gallons of water)
I was looking and hoping for a Canadian comment! We are so mixed up here! Even just warm temps - I know more in Fahrenheit, but cooler temps I know in Celsius. It must be due to the pool temps always being warmer!
I'm an American, and we also, for the most part, use time for distance rather than saying miles. Maybe the sheer size of the countries makes us use time instead?
@@Libertaro-i2u yeah, using the imperial system in a scientific setting is usually seen to be pretty goofy but most of the time in everyday life, it's what we use over metric (unless you're a runner).
Australia switched over to the metric/celcius system in 1973 which was the year I started school. I sort of understand feet and inches but everything else is too complicated. The metric system is much easier to work with.
thats because its what you were taught in school. if you were taught imperial then that would seem easier. metric isnt as good as everyone who uses it would have you believe, otherwise americans would have switched already. its not a big deal.
@@StatueofGuyThinkinghow is that “not as good” when it is just… As simple as possible? You have: grams for weight Metres for length Litres for volume That’s literally all you need to know to understand metric system, because everything else is just a prefix. And surprise surprise, the prefix is exactly the same for everything! Kilo-gram = 1000 grams Kilo-metre = 1000 metres Mili-litre/metre = 1/1000 of a litre / metre Can you instantly tell me how many inches are there in a mile? Oh, I looks like the answer is no. Can I tell you how many centimetres are there in a kilometre? Oh course I can, because centimetre is 10^-2 and kilometre is 10^3. So the answer would be 10^5. That’s exactly the reason your country’s whole science industry switched to metric long long time ago.
@@StatueofGuyThinking, get real. I was born in 1946, and I grew up using only imperial. When our brain-dead politicians finally woke up to themselves, we changed to metric. Metric is light years ahead of imperial.
The ISO standard for recording dates is YYYY-MM-DD which is being adopted by most companies that do international business. It makes it easier to sort data electronically by date this way.
ISO 8601 is a suitable standard for electronic data interchange, but not a way that any normal person would write a date on a check. There are many ways to write dates, more than a score. The essential requirement is that the date be understood in the context in which it is used.
@@GH-oi2jfWell, I am Hungarian, and we are using the YYYY. MM. DD. format both officially and privately. We might leave the year out when not important to mention.
In Denmark we do not use checks anymore, and have not been using Them for a number of years. They are not valid for payments anymore. Only cash or creditcard/debit cards or pay with phone are accepted. Less Then 10% of all payments are made by cash.
@@GH-oi2jf I'm Swedish and always write dates as 2024-10-26. Not on checks though, since I haven't seen a check in the last 30-35 years and never had one in my possession.
Yeah...for instance, for a very long time we tended to talk about low temperatures in Celsius and high ones in Fahrenheit. My theory about that is that the cold numbers are more impressive-sounding in Celsius and the hot ones in Fahrenheit...making it easier to complain about the weather! Lately we tend to talk about both extremes in Celsius...
@@berlineczka Sometimes mm (e.g. 150, 120, 110, 76, 75, 30, 20, 9, 7.62, 5.56), sometimes 0.inches (e.g. 0.50, 0.45). But it is a dodgy area, given lbs (e.g. 25 pounder, 17 pounder) for artillery and gauge (12 bore, 10 bore etc.) for shotguns let alone introducing the concept of calibre. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caliber
Fun factor, Celsius originally had the scale the other way around. 0°C for water boils and 100°C for water freezes. But that was reversed, water freezes at 0°C. Fahrenheit and Celsius are the same, at least at -40°C = -40°F
Except it's Centigrade and uses no degree symbol, was later renamed after Celsius-put the degree symbol is still incorrect as it is just a shifted Kelvin scale.
@@bowez9 The symbol for degrees Celsius is °C, and the degree symbol is not only correct but required because C on its own without a degree symbol is a coulomb.
In Canada we adopted metric when I was a child. But everything here is influenced by the USA. So we got used to different measurements. Older Canadians are used to a mixed system. Outdoor weather in celsius but inside thermostat in Fahrenheit. Body weights are still done in pounds but we shop for food in grams and kg. Speeds are km but gas mileage is often quoted in mpg. We also use am/pm. Elevators are done differently in Quebec than in the rest of Canada. Yes it is confusing.
Writing the dates as Month-Day-Year used to be a thing in other countries, too - though, concurrently with Day-Month-Year (which was still the most common format) and Year-Day-Month. I'm Portuguese and I do genealogy. Well, I've come across some Portuguese documents, namely death records from the Catholic Church, where the date is written, e.g. "Fevereiro 12 e 13 do anno de 1855", i.e., "February 12 and 13 of the year 1855". I also have a photo of a pilgrimage to the sanctuary of Lourdes in 1910 or so, and the date on the photos caption is also Month-Day-Year. But most records are definitely Day-Month-Year, though in the 17th century it was quite common to write dates as Year-Day-Month: "In the year of Our Lord of 1690, on the 22nd day of March..."
Yeah, but up to recently we wrote the month name out, so it was obvious. It's only since we had things like spreadsheets that we needed a format dd-mm-yy or whatever. Most newspapers still put the month before the day - e.g. September 13, 2024.
I was a teacher in Canada for 33 years, starting in 1981, and in all that time we only taught the metric system although the imperial system had to be explained for older texts. But basically our students worked exclusively in the metric system.
Also an interesting tidbit on info people may have or not have known. When the UK went metric, the UK never changed our steel beam and column sizes for use in building structures. The notation simply changed to mm. So a UB254x146x31 beam seems random nonsense, until you convert it inches and realised that it is 10" deep (254mm) x 5" wide (146mm) and 20lb/ft (31kg/m), the round numbers make sense.
IMHO - the U.S. never switched to metric because the government really screwed up how it was introduced. I was about 10 when this all went down in the mid-1970's. PSAs on TV told us "the metric system is easier" but never really impressed upon as to why that is true. (Simple example: 0.75L = 750mL = EASY. Quick, how many oz. in 0.75 qt.? Um, not so easy.) But then as 4th graders we came home from school with math problems like "If Sally wants to make a cake using two cups of flour, how many mL is that?" Anyone looking to make a cake is NEVER going to measure out 473.18mL of flour. But when presented that way, it makes the metric system sound awfully complicated and convoluted. What we really needed was something akin to "Schoolhouse Rock" for adults, played during prime time TV, to introduce everything.
What is a cup with flour, how big is the cup, how much do you put in the cup and so on and so on. Measure it precisely so you know how much you put in.
@@Kermit198007 not sure I understand your comment but a cup is 8 liquid oz. If you're trying to precisely measure it you would use measuring cups. One liquid oz of water weighs very close to one oz, so for cooking you can also weigh 8oz instead of using measuring cups and often it's close enough. The problem with the metric system in the US is we use already use both, and we are already more familiar with the US imperial system. So it's like learning a second language. Even if that language is easier to speak, because we learned English first, we think in English and then try to translate it over. Same applies with metric. People who use metric have a good idea of how much a liter is. But if you say liter here, instead of immediately knowing how much that is, most people think "okay a bit more than a quart.". So even though the metric system is easier as far as switching around between different units, those units do not mean much to us, and it becomes kind of an arbitrary conversion like the example OP used. I don't know how far 300 meters is, but I know how far 300 yards is, so I guess about 10% further than that
They started teaching us the metric system when I was in 3rd grade in the 70s. And then they just stopped. If they had continued, we would have completely adopted the metric system by now, I don't understand why they stopped.
For me it was the late 90s early 2000s and they were teaching us nothing but metric and expected us to just know the customary system in later grades. I suspect they didn't really "stop" so much as the program only covered early grades.
Most, if not all, states still teach the metric system in schools. Don't forget that there isn't a US education system, there are over fifty over them as there is one for each state, territory, DC, etc.
We have a mixed system in the USA and most people ate quite used to it. We buy our milk by the gallon and our soda by the liter. Athletes are timed in the 40 yard dash, but we run meter races. We buy our marijuana by the ounce and our cocaine by the gram. It works well for us.
Claiming that Fahrenheit is more “intuitive” is like pricing stuff in dollar is more intuitive because you know how much dollar you have to pay for a cheese burger and it’d make no sense in yen Yeah, it’s “intuitive” for you because that’s what you’re used to
@@zachv Being “intuitive” is the logic that only Americans use to defend Fahrenheit and I’ve never seen anyone doing the same for Celsius They often claim Celsius makes more sense scientifically
@@junkvideos4527 Well you just haven't been observant enough. To begin with it's more than "just Americans" that still use F. You're just used to C so you think it's better. But for everyday use F is a better tool because it is more precise. 20ºC is cool, while 30º is quite warm. The equivalent in F is 68 and 86. The range of 18 degrees from cold to warm gives more precise info than 10 and it makes a lot of difference when someone in informed of the temp for example. You can do the same thing with 70ºF and 90F: 21ºC & 32ºC, 20 degress vs 11, about half the precision information is provided in C. If you are not used to F then you'll have trouble getting the point, but the fact is that F is simply more precise. To make the point, consider if we only used 2 degrees instead of 10, from 20 to 30...how precise would that be? This is an endless debate. Temperature scales is how WE humans measure heat and cold, which is what Fahrenheit's scale was based on: Human tempt being set to be 100º, while Celsius based it on water. Someone else could choose another element. Kelvin based it on absolute zero, the theoretical temp where matter ceases to exist. If we were made of pure water, it would be fine but we are not. Water is just an arbitrary choice element. Salt water has a different freezing point, a lower one thankfully that Celcius could have chosen instead, or maybe some entirely other element! Kay sera-sera.... Your biases are not a tool to argue with, as they are by definition different from other people's biases.
Look. Fahrenheit uses the concept that 0 is probably the coldest you will ever experience and 100 is probably the hottest you will experience. No one ever felt the temperature of boiling/freezing water should be some special value. And celsius is a derived value as an offset to degrees Kelvin which is the metric unit for thermodynamic temperature. So if you really want to go purely metric, your typical temps ought to go between 273 and 313, not 0 to 40. And while we're at throwing stones, you folks under metric do not use weight units correctly. Google it, the metric system unit of weight (force) is the Newton, the kilogram is the unit of mass. They are not the same thing. If you mass 100 kg on Earth, you're 100kg everywhere in the universe. But on earth you weigh 981 Newtons and on the moon, ~166 Newtons.
@@robruk3806 “0 is probably the coldest you will experience” in Europe/US, yeah “100 is probably the hottest you will experience” in Europe/US, possibly I can easily tell it’s fucking nonsense obviously not meant to be “intuitive” for us Asians
14:07 The East Asian date format makes more sense to me than either the American or European date formats. We do numbers in left to right descending order (i.e. thousands -> hundreds -> tens -> units) and time in descending order (i.e. hours -> minutes -> seconds), so I think it only makes sense that dates should also be written in descending order (i.e. years -> months -> days).
Programmers love the East Asian format. And if you're a programmer and a K-pop/anime fan, you use it and see it more than usual that you even use it in your daily life.
When Japanese speak dates it goes year month day and looks something like 2024年9月14日. So, it makes sense to write it this way. In English we say it as September 14, ,2024, so it makes sense to write it month day year
Doing surveying, cartography, and planning for the US military, I use meters for distance, kilograms for weight, and I include Celsius wherever I can (although it's always alongside Fahrenheit for "translation"). But, the second I have to work with a contractor, the architects start throwing around their 3/16 inches and construction guys want materials converted to arbitrary quantities of pounds. Not to mention the level of confusion that is unleashed when I schedule a meeting for 1430. Oh, forgot to mention, in a lot of cases, we even tend to write the date 13 Sept 24.
@@General.Knowledge I have made that mistake a few times and have become very, very careful about double-checking all of my conversion math. But when I'm doing work around my own house or baking or whatnot, it's always easiest for me to keep things metric.
@mwphoenix3317 Sounds like Canada where a hodgepodge of both systems are in use 😄 Feet and inches for a person's height but centimeters, meter, kilometers for everything else... except for construction (to be compatible with the US I believe and probably historic tooling reasons). So I feel your contractor comment! Also pounds for a person's weight but grams and kilograms for pretty much everything else...
@@General.Knowledge In Canada we also often have to convert between because we use both for different things. Like Celsius for most temperatures but pool temperatures for some reason are always set in Fahrenheit... As well as some older home thermostats in Fahrenheit though all modern ones do Celsius (or have an option to switch between the two).
The ISO standard date format is YYYY:MM:DD (big-endian). Ironically, the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) defines US customary units in metric (SI) units. That has been the practice since 1893.
I generally recommend using this in writing in general. It's alphabetical and unambiguous any date starting with the year can only be that. I use the iso format everywhere. The US month-day-year is not too strange considering it's how the dates are pronounced, makes sense to write them down as such.
@@qlum Well in Swedish we always used day-month (e.g. 7 May) in common use so that boils down to language more than standards. In daily speech we say ddmmyy but in letters or forms it often yymmdd, Aren't we living in wonderful world lol. Fun fact is that I still get confused of 9/11 as it means 9 november to me.
Don't forget us Americans getting rid of the 13th floor in tall enough buildings. Shows that there's superstition among the people that in order to sell rooms they call the 13th floor the 14th.
Fun fact: south of Tucson, Arizona, USA there is one single highway that uses kilometers instead of miles to measure distance on all the signs. Interstate 19. I have no idea why but there it is.
There used to be a pair of signs on I-44 outside Rolla, MO that gave the distances to St. Louis (heading east) and Springfield (heading west) in kilometers. I suspect the Feds told Missouri they had to put up some metric signs, and they figured "let's put them on the highway outside the engineering school; if anybody's going to know what a kilometer is, it's going to be those guys."
Fun fact: There are some signs on the interstates in New Mexico that are still in kilometers. They never changed it back to miles. Fun fact 2: When I was in the US the other day, cops pulled me over and asked for my ID and drivers license. They looked at it for quite some time, and asked me which month the 15th is supposed to be in my birth date. So I had to educate them that in Yurop we write dd/MM/yyyy instead of MM/dd/yyyy
Kinda all of ex-soviet countries goes straight from 1. 0 is literally ground level, anywhere up or down from the floor itself should go plus or minus. The thing that drove me crazy in Israel with these zero(ground, entrance) floors which sometimes are stacked over by parking floors before actual numbers, so you look up to your meeting info which says "2nd floor" and skip the elevator waiting time to loose more of it climbing 0-P1-P2-1-2😅
The UK and Canada still use some variants of Imperial measures in some usages, often with regards to food, clothes or weight of a person. And also in the construction business I think.
The US is pretty well mixed. We know our US Customary Units, but have a good sense for metric measurements as well outside of temperature. Also Canada is mixed, not fully metric. Ask a Canadian how tall they are or how much they weigh. You’ll get the answer in US Customary Units. Also go buy a TV anywhere you live. Go buy wheels on your car. Those all use US Customary units. A 55” TV is a 55” TV everywhere in the world. Your phone screen is 6 inches, etc. Your wheels are 20 inches, etc. As for switching, it is too engrained here and we’d have to change out millions of road signs at this point. Every US Interstate or highway has mile markers and most of our exits are calibrated against the mile markers - so shifting would be a gargantuan task that would cost billions of dollars. We also are mostly metric in our business. All our units are defined against metric units and everything is made in metric calibrated US units.
The US does *not* use the "Imperial" system (which, BTW, is not a system because there is nothing systematic in it...). The US uses the *US Customary System* (also not a system...), which uses the same *names* as the Imperial (i.e. British) "system", but with *different measurements:* e.g. a US gallon and an Imperial (British) gallon are different quantities.
Actually, in the US, both systems are used in different professional situations. Medical, dental, and other scientific professions use the metric system. All of our groceries are labeled in both systems. Dairy product are sold in US customary units, but labeled with both systems, whereas soft drinks that are sold in bottles are primarily metric and still the US standard in cans. As far as paper in the engineering and architectural professions both systems are found. You showed the A sizes, but these also have B, C, D, and E sizes. The A papers set side by side make up a B size, rotate the B 90° set another along side you have the C size likewise you increase to the D size, and E size. Also, Paper sizes are similar for the US letter size. We use 8.5×11 inches, 11×17 inches 17×22 inches, 22×34 inches, and 34×44 inches. All of which we call A, B, C, D, and E respectively. Then we also have 12×18, 18×24, 24×36, 36×48 inch sizes used the later are used more often by Architects, while the engineers use the letter sixes. The real reason why the US doesn't change is the majority of the citizens don't want to change. It is the system we learned and understand and we don't want to change. If someone tells me what the temperature is in Farenheit, I know what it is, if they tell me in Celsius I have to do a math calculation and convert it to Farenheit before I know how warmer cold it is. Same for distance, weight and volume.
I'm from the US and I've taken it upon myself to switch all my personal devices to metric, 24h, and DDMMYYYY. I've never liked that we don't use metric like everyone else so I wanted to make sure I could at least understand metric.
@@petermsiegel573 Stones are only used informally, they're not an official measurement any more. Britain uses metric for everything, except for speed and distance road signs, beer and cider sizes, re-usable milk containers, and precious metals.
I've never understood why anyone would want to be exactly like everyone else. Diversity is our strength and all that, and yet the modern "progressives" want to make everyone completely indistinguishable.
10:46 While these units and conversions within US Customary, colloquially called Imperial in this video, is correct, many of the units on this graphic are not commonly used, let alone widely known any more. Hands are still used in the context of determining the height of horses, more out of tradition than anything else. Chains are still somewhat used in the context of surveying, as that was the base tool used for surveying many years ago. Leagues may still be used in some nautical circles, but I would say that the average person uses it as much as they might use score, or fortnight as a measurement in this day and age. 11:30 The reason the US cups and the rest of the British Commonwealth cups don't match up is we broke away before the UK converted their cup to be more inline with an easy conversion with metric system, moving from the previous 236.6 ml of cup to 250 ml. We retained the old measurement, while they updated. One other note that I will say when it comes to the US Customary/Imperial systems and why so many people talk about it being more intuitive for day to day, is because, like many of the measurements metric replaced in other countries, many of our measurements are based of of human proportions and perception. 1 inch is roughly the length of the first segment of a person's thumb, and a half inch is roughly the thumb's width. A foot is roughly the length of a grown man's foot. Shocker, I know. A yard is roughly a full pace or the length of the distance from a man's fingertips to the center of his chest. As a person who works in design and construction, it's nice to be able to roughly walk something off without a tape measure or walking wheel to get ballpark measurements. Fahrenheit, though based off the internal body temperature of a horse, 100 F, lines up closely with the internal body temperature of a human, 98.6 F. So in perceiving ambient temperatures, like for weather or climate control in buildings, it's seems much more intuitive when you are fine tuning human perception by a few degrees. That being said, I will concede that metric is much better for contexts where precision is needed, in which cases, the US generally uses it, like in manufacturing, scientific applications, etc.
If you spell "Imperial" with a capital "I" that is a proper noun referring to The Weights and Measures Act of 1824 from the U.K.. The U.S. does not use the capital "I" Imperial system. Our customary system of measurements is imperial but not Imperial. The word "customary" is *NOT* the official name of our measuring units. The word "customary" is literally just a description of our units. The word "customary" in "U.S. customary units" should not be capitalized. Anyway, all this ridiculousness goes away once we have fully metricated.
Honestly I think it seems more "intuitive" because you're used to it and have internalized it. Canada uses a weird mix of metric and Imperial (and American standard which is often slightly different) and people in Canada have internalized the use of certain units of measure for some things and other units for other things. For example many people are used to pounds for the weight of a person, but gladly use grams and kilograms for their groceries and other things. Similarly using feet and inches for the height of a person but centimeters, meters, and kilometers for almost everything else... except for construction (probably for compatibility with the US). Yet people internalize the system that they're used to for the particular purpose and using other system for that purpose feels... odd.
When it comes to precision. It is not the measurement system that is precise. It is the measuring instruments and the people using them. Comfortable in both US customary and SI l fully agree that SI is far more logical.
The Philippines is slowing adapting to metric measurement for paper although this makes choosing paper more confusing. Now, we have Letter, Legal, and A4.
Although I'm using a 24h time format on my laptop, phone, for work,... When I tell the time I mostly say it's 2 o'clock or 6 o'clock and based on the time of the day it's clear what's meant. Who even says it's 15:31. 😅
I work in the US in an industry where 24 time format is standard... I recently switched jobs to a company that only has a small division in our industry... and having to go back to 12 hour time was a bit of a shock.
Sounds like a language thing to me. In German, just saying the equivalent of "fifteen thirty-one" has become a lot more common starting with the spread of digital clocks in the 90s.
The reason the U.S. went with what became the “customary” system today, is cause in the 1790’s when we were trying to adopt a standard weight & measurement system, the Frenchmans boat who was bringing over the metric stuff to show/demonstrate was blown off course due to a storm down to the carribean, and was attacked by what was basically British privateers…. Aka, Pirates. So we developed what became our system now.
And the Federal Government, in that case, preferred metric units if there was no overriding reason to use US customary units. But states were in a distrust of the new federal Republic phase, so the metric law was mainly used to decide disputes in interstate and international commerce issues. For local purposes, local units ruled.
Basic error from get go. America doesn’t use imperial measurements. It uses US Customary units. Both are different standardisations of ‘English units’ but imperial units are the British 19th century standardisation. British tons are slightly heavier and pints slightly larger.
From what I observed in the UK as a tourist is that they used miles on road signs for distances or speed limits (mph). Speedometers show both mph and kph. They sell petrol (gasoline in the US) by the litre [which we spell liter]. While most commerce uses metric measures, many Brits still use pounds (and sometimes stone) to indicate their weight and use feet and inches to indicate their height. They use the Imperial pint or a yard (shorter than a meter) for beer/ale glasses. I suspect the US will switch to metric in bars before Brits give up their pints in pubs. They'll leave metric beer glasses to the Germans. They still use acres instead of hectares for measuring land areas; in the US, we do the same and unbelievably, the acre is the same in both countries.
Yeah but that’s because when the uk went metric lots of it wasn’t compulsory. It was a half arsed effort. I’m an ex pat now living in New Zealand where everything is metric. It took a little getting used to as I still worked height in feet and inches and body weight in stones but already had the grams for cooking and Celsius for temperature.
As someone who was born and still lives in the UK, I think I can explain in which way we use both “imperial” and “metric systems: 1. Roads and Transport: The UK uses imperial units for road signs, including distances (miles, yards) and speed limits (miles per hour). However, fuel is sold by the litre, and engine capacities are typically measured in litres as well. If you gave me or any other fellow Brit a distance in KM, I wouldn’t understand 😭 2. Retail and Everyday Use: - Food and Drink: Most packaged goods display both metric (grams, litres) and imperial units (pounds, ounces), but metric is more commonly used in product labeling. Drinks in pubs are still sold in pints. - Body Measurements: People often use a mix, with height commonly given in feet and inches, and weight sometimes in stones and pounds. But usually, we use KG to measure body mass. Again, here in the UK, it’s very common to measure height in feet’s and inches like the USA which cm being used not so often. 3. Construction and Engineering: Metric units are generally used for measurements in construction, engineering, and scientific work. However, some traditional trades (like carpentry) still use feet and inches. 4. Education: Schools primarily teach metric units, but students are also introduced to imperial measurements to understand their usage in the real world.
The use of the A0 paper sizes is much more rational than the previous paper sizes in United Kingdom. When it comes to envelopes for posting letters there is a C size standard, so C5 takes A5 paper. Common paper sizes used to be Quarto, 10 x 8 inches or Foolscap 23 x 8 inches. Book size or poster sizes had many quirky measurements.
The US legally approved the Metric system in the 1870s. Before that Jefferson wanted to adopt it in the early 1800s. I can use either one. Metric ismore logical. Neither is more precise. Precision lies in the instrumentation. And why don't we use Metric for time and angular measurements.
For your last question i believe that most of the world already used the 12 hour clock and degrees for angles. For weight, distance and volume every town used to have their own measurement. Therefore criminals could easily scam foreigners. France tried to change the clock to metric, but time didn't need fixing because everyone knows what a minute and an hour is. Weeks and months primarily have to do with religion though. And back then everyone believed in a god
Time: year, month and day are defined by sun, moon and earth. Were seconds defined with metric already? There was not much left, especially if time was already globally standardized at the time...
Time measurement using the same logic as the metric has been tried in France during the French Revolution. 1 day = 10 hours. 1 hour = 100 minutes. A year = 12 monthes. A month = 30 days + 5 or 6 additional days to fit the 365 days cycle. A week = 10 days. Add to this new months names and new way to count the years This was legal from 1793 to 1800. The law was published on 24 November 1793, using the French Revolutionnary Calendar : 4 frimaire an II. Link to the French wikipedia page about Decimal Time, you'll see a nice pic of a decimal clock from 1795 : fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temps_d%C3%A9cimal_en_France
Fahrenheit is more accurate than Celsius if you limit yourself to expressing temperatures as whole numbers. At most you'll be off by half a degree, but half a Fahrenheit degree is less than half a Celsius degree.
I attended elementary school in the late 1970s - when the U.S. was actively trying to switch to metric. So I was taught (and still use) both systems. Those of us who grew up in that peculiar time probably have the best handle on the advantages and disadvantages for both systems. I prefer metric in most cases, but there are a few instances where Imperial units just work better. 12 inches in a foot is divisible by 2, 3, 4, 6 and still yield integers. 10 cm in a dm is only divisible by 2 and 5. If you want to divide a dm (or even a meter) by 3, you get a repeating fraction. Meaning it's impossible to do it precisely. You have to adjust the larger structure to be (say) 90 cm instead of 1 meter if you want to divide it into 3 equal parts. Which defeats some of the advantage of everything being divisible by 10. 1 degree Farenheit is pretty close to the smallest temperature change you can feel. In the U.S., you can adjust the temperature on car and house thermostats by increments of 1 degree F. In the rest of the world, they have to kludge it so you can adjust it in increments of 0.5 degrees C. Farenheit tried to make human body temperature 100 F but he had a badly calibrated thermometer. Aside from that hiccup, body temperature is consistent unless you're sick. So you always know where 98.6 F is. OTOH, 100 C being the boiling point of water is not as useful a static benchmark since the boiling point varies with altitude (atmospheric pressure). If you travel at 60 mph (moderate highway speed), you travel 1 mile per minute. Makes it really easy to estimate how many more minutes of highway travel you have left if you have x miles to go. Highway speed in metric is about 100 km/h, which is 1.6666 km per minute. So it's not as handy for estimates. (Likewise, there are lots of places where metric just works better. e.g. It's set up so 1 liter = 1 kg of water, which makes estimating liquid weights easier. I'm not trying to say Imperial is always superior. Just that there are cases where it works better.)
@@solandri69 I was brought up in the UK in the 1970's. I think Imperial, work metric. It only seems to be the last generation or so over here who actually think in metric. I was born the year before we officially decimalised our currency, you should have seen it before, what was it...12 pennies to the shilling, 20 shillings to the pound, or 21 to the guinea.... probably about half a dozen coins and six or 7 notes. Of course, the simpler they made the currency, up went the prices. Less division of value.
Usual highway speed in Europe is around 120 km/h (100 - 140/unlimited), that's 2 km per minute, so what? 60 mph are 1 mile per minute, that's 1.618 km. Tell me, that's better than 5/3 km = 1.667 km in one minute. We are all calculating in the decimal system, except minutes and seconds (60) as well as hours (24/12) etc. Fahrenheit is the most insane unit. Why do you follow the measurements of Liberia? At least you personally are trained in both systems, so you understand the rest of the world and science. And if not, some vehicle crashes on the face of Mars... LOL
I always thought the argument that 0°C is freezing and 100° is boiling to be the strangest argument to recommend the system. Who sticks to thermometer in water to tell if it’s frozen or boiling you look at it; if it’s hard it’s frozen; if you heat it until it bubbles, it’s boiling. You don’t stick a thermometer in to check that. On the other hand, a scale where 0° and 100° are temperatures that you can understand because you’ve experienced them seems very practical. Having grown up in the 70s and frequently using things like centimeters, liters/milliliters and grams in my day-to-day life, depending upon what task I was doing, I’ve easily been able to integrate those into my brain. But Celsius just never came to me I can’t take some thing that’s already an abstraction, temperature turning into a feeling, and then be able to convert that to a whole different scale.
@@pjschmid2251 It's the other way round: When the water boils, I know, it's 100°C without any tool like a thermometer. When water freezes, it's around 0°C. Both values with a certain tolerance (because of presure, salt, and other paremeters), but it works good as an estimate. When it's snowing and doesn't melt, I can estimate, that it's 0°C outside, all without needing a thermometer. It's quite helpful to bind these values on visual changes of the state of aggregation of that water. And no, I'm not putting a thermometer into water to see if it boils over! What an idea to do!
"Leave it to the Germans to come up with the most efficient way to fold a Piece of Paper", yes, i managed the Art of folding any Paper Size into A4. Learnt it in school :P and i will inherit that knowledge to my Apprentice soon.
Actually, it is using both systems simultaneously. For auto fasteners, a lot are metric. For construction, most buildings are based on 4’ x8’ panels, and what is evenly divisible into them. For ammunition reloading, most weight measures are in grains, the old pharmacists measurement. Plus, there is a great deal of incumbency, like qwerty keyboards.
10:30 Please don't fall into the "accuracy/precision" trap. Precision is how finely divided and perceptible it is. Accuracy is adherence to, or the amount of devation from, a standard. So if your inch (or centimeter) is too big or too small, it is inaccurate. If you're measuring something to the nearest mm, it's more precise than if you measure it to the nearest cm.
As an American ... When I was in school studying science, I couldn't understand why the US didn't switch to metric. As you scale up and down, it's trivial to conver from meters to kilometers. Not so easy to convert from feet to miles. It's easy to convert from cubic centimeters to liters. Not so easy to convert from cubic inches to gallons. Etc. then I graduated and got a job that did not involve science. And suddenly the advantages of metric evaporated. In my daily life, I almost never need to convert miles to feet, etc. the advantages are trivial compared to the nuisance of learning a new system, and the expense of replacing so many tools. Now I live in the Philippines, which is mostly metric. I'm struggling to get a feel for just how heavy a kilogram is, just how hot 25 degrees is, etc. (what makes it worse is that the Philippines occasionally uses American measurements. So like, my wife and I were just buying drapes. I measured all our windows in cm. Then we got to the store and all the drape were labeled in inches! Arrgh!)
Why would you have to convert feet to miles? Give me a practical reason for doing so. When do you do that? Originally a mile was 1,000 marching paces. Mile = mille or 1,000 steps. Now there's some practical metric for ya. It was how Rome conquered the known world.
The formula converting F to C and/or vv, reveals through the fraction “5/9” that every two degrees F is about a degree C. This is a major obstacle in convincing users of Fahrenheit that Celsius is better because there is more variation in temperature numbers that give more information in Fahrenheit. To illustrate, 10C = 50F & 30C= 86F. So the difference of 20 degrees C is equivalent to 36 degrees F! That’s a lot more temperature information provided by F. In Celsius, 20 is cool while 30 is warm. 10 degrees is too little differentiation to provide enough temperature information for those of us used to Fahrenheit. C just feels like a coarser measurement system . For the record, I have spent roughly equal amounts of time in countries using both, so I can speak with living experience of both.
No problem for people who use the metric system. As a kid I learned e.g. : When you drive to the mountains it gets colder 0.5 °C any 100 m you gain altitude. So when you live at 200 m above sea level and it's 2°C outside in winter take your car (driven by the parents off course) and go to the nearest montain resort at 900 m. There it will be -1.5°C and snow will not melt away. So you can take your sledge with you and enjoy a day in winter wonderland....
Celsius is fine enough. You would be hard pressed to tell the difference between 67 and 68 F. If you want it finer, you can always go for 0.5C steps. But usually other factors matter more when determining how cold/warm it is, like is there any wind or does the sun shine (temperature is given in shade). It certainly affects my decisions more when I try to find out what to wear in my next cycling trip…
The US does use metric in government, medicine, and industry (mostly). Public (government organizations) always use metric. The law that made it so does not force private entities to use it. That’s why we’re not metric oriented.
No when the government tried to switch us we threatened the lives of every politician. Being an armed populace they took our threats quite seriously. You've no idea what happened then if you weren't there. I was there so I do know. I ain't saying now either. Because I benefit every day from us not using metric. Every American does.
@@DiggyPT I'm glad you can see how obfuscation has its benefits. Because most can't be asked to do those conversions. So we can cheat them. We do too. All the time. If you're a foreigner we're cheating you right now. Cheating you out of trillions of dollars. You sucker! Hehe! Now excuse me while I laugh all the way to the bank.
All ASTM standards are nowadays in the SI-system, some times with US system in brackets. All international industries also use the SI-system. It is time for US to change. It can be done gradually as they did in UK with temperatues. First they started to show the Celcius temperature in brackets on the weateher maps for some years, the they changed to have the Fahrenhiet in brackets for some years and finally they deleted the Farhremheit. regards from Sweden, the land of Celcius.
The date thing is because we say "June 30th" in speech. So you use the months first as it matches natural speech patterns. That isn't to say there aren't times when you might say the 30th of June, but it's probably less common.
As a US kid in teh 1970s I remember spending about 6 yeas leaning both systems because we were supsoed to be converting to metric. Ronald Regan getting elected president is why the program ended. if Jimmy Carter had been re-elected I believe the conversion would have continued. For the record we are exposed to metric here every ruler has inches and centimeters/millimeters, every thermometer also has Celsius. Our large bottles of soda have been 2 liters since the late 70s. No one here has an issue with this. Most single serving bottles of water are 1/2 liters. Our medicine is typically in milligrams. Our food has the weight listed in both oz/lbs and grams/kg. My can of Pringles says 5.5 ounces( 158 grams ). While our cars odometers are still in imperial the speedometers have both MPH and KMPH. Our clocks can be set for either 12 hours or 24 hours. And for the record no one says 9 PM is 21 o'clock. even in other English speaking countries. So the 12 hours system is better since it's the way people speak. Also our date system is better A) it's the way we say the dates. B) Also easier to organize. If you're creating a file system are you putting all the 26ths of the month in one folder? And have 31 different folders with each folder containing 12 months? No you have MONTH folder filled with each day that month become it makes sense. If I show you the first 2 digits of a date in your system and it's say 08. Well that could be anywhere from Jan 8th to Dec 8th. In the US system you automatically know its August. I've narrowed down the exact date to a range of 31 days instead of 335 days
Mostly true, as a fellow US citizen, I use 24 hour time, but majority of the population uses 12 hour time and only the US Military uses 24 hour time giving to reason why most US citizens call it "Military time"…
@@jescis0 So if it's 9 PM you say 21 o'clock so people don't know WTF you are talking about? Even in places like the UK they'll say 21:00 as 9 o'clock so why not have that way on the damn clock?
@harryballsak1123 no I say 2100 hours for 9 PM, it's not complicated and I had desire to join the Military because of my family and the only reason why I wasn't accepted was because I was born with epileptic seizures and Cerebral Palsy… plus it's my choice to use 24 hour time, though for others that don't know it as well as I do, I say 9 PM or 9 O'clock…
As a British person it really annoys me when my countryman pretend only Americans use imperial. Despite the fact the vast majoriry of people use it here for many things
Whenever I run marathons or race in triathlons abroad I can never convert distances in my head during the event; I’m too accustomed to miles. It really messes with my head throughout the event especially since signage doesn’t include mileage in smaller print.
UK Here- As a millennial- it’s gotten allot more straight forward in the UK as the metric system is exclusively taught in schools now. My parents still use some of the old measurements whereas I do not. Transportation is where the old measurements are still standard. Non exhaustive list of what I use in the UK- I will reffer mostly to the master unit but we use the metric smaller units when It makes sense. Outside Temperature: Celsius Cooking: Celsius (With the exception of BBQ where I use American Recipes) Weight of a person: KG Smaller weights: Grams Height of a person: Meters (Although feet and inches is still fairly common) Measurements (DIY): Meters Distance (Sports) - Meters Volume of a Liquid- Litres Transportation is where the old measurements are still the staples: Speed- MPH Distance- Miles and Yards Tyre Pressure- PSI Fuel Economy- MPG (UK Gallon) Fuel Volume- Litres
You want to know which bits of the metric system we (Britain) use? Mostly metric, personally I think we should go full metric. Beer is still in pints, but most other pub measures (wine & spirits) are metric. The major one we still need to change is roads. People still usually do their heights in ft & inches, and weight in stone & lb. I've started doing my weight in kg and when I tell people what it is nobody asks what it is in stone.
For me as a European, I know, that 1000 meters is a kilometer, pretty simple, but goodness knows how many feet in a mile. The imperial system is just confusing as hell. If the US would switch to metric, collaboration between international teams would be much easier.
It's 5,280 feet per mile. It is easy to convert. If you can't figure out how to convert back and forth easily then I can say with confidence that you are not an engineer.
9-11, the terror date helps me to remember how to write a specific date in the US, because it is also the phone number for emergency In my own data i write everything in the "China"-format for an easier sequence system
Missing the most important features - The aspect ratio of the DIN format series A, B and C is 1∶√2 and you just can get the next smaller size by folding the longest side into half. If you fold A4 you get A5 and if you fold A5 you get A6 and so on. It works in the other direction too. Two A4 sheets are the size of one A3 sheet... DIN B represents the untrimmed printed sheet formats and is therefore suitable as packaging for the corresponding DIN A formats. This is why folders, binders and mailing envelopes are produced in DIN B. B5 and B6 are also popular formats for books. DIN C is the standard format for envelopes that only can hold a few sheets, for more you get a Din B envelope. DIN C5/C6 is the standard size for business mail. And only a few realize there is a DIN D, too. It is rare that Din D is used, but we all know something that uses DIN D and that is the DVD case that is DIN D5.
Great video as always. Here in Malaysia, in school we only learn the metric systems. Only in higher ed levels we encounter imperial systems. But in individual households old people still use imperial units here and there (except Fahrenheit, we phased that out completely lol) and the young ones pick up on those and used them occasionally. And GK, another thing I don't mean to pick on you, but just slight correction about reading numbers after decimal point. Numbers after decimal are pronounced digit by digit. For example 2.54 is pronounced *_"two point five four",_* and not _"two point fifty four"._ It doesn't make sense to pronounce 2.540 as _"two point five hundred forty"_ even though it's identical to 2.54. Hope that helps. Thanks for the great content!
The US does NOT use the imperial measurement system. This is a common misconception. The US uses the US customary measurement system. While many of the measurements are the same or very similar to the imperial system, some are quite different, particularly in the volume measurements. An imperial pint is not the same as a US pint nor is an imperial gallon the same as a US gallon. Also, the US does use the metric system. It just doesn’t use it exclusively, nor do people use it commonly in their every day tasks. But businesses and science largely use the metric system, as does the US government.
Actually when Great Britain adopted the standard inch they also abolished the Imperial system. That happened in 1958. The archaic Imperial inch was 2 millionths shorter than a standard inch is.
Where US units differ from Imperial, the American ones are generally the older. Similar to once-British words such as 'gotten', 'soccer', and 'fall' (for autumn).
@@kenaikuskokwim9694 The story of the Standard inch varies depending on the source but the Standard inch in use today is not the old Imperial nor is it the old US inch either. Although looking at three of them you couldn't tell any of them apart by eye or even with fairly common instruments. They're only separated by millionths of parts from each other. Which is where a lot of the confusion stems from. Being as no one can see any of the differences easily they assume it's all the same.
@@1pcfredthe process of replacing the Imperial inch with the 25.4mm standard/international/metric inch throughout the British Empire started in the 1930s. Around the same time the US stared changing from the US Customary inch to the same standard of 25.4mm.
@@markevans2294 that's the story I heard the other day. Previously I'd heard things differently though. I wasn't there as it all happened before my time so I can't tell you. What I can tell you is that Ford bought Johansson and moved him to Ann Arbor Michigan. So we got the goods.
It'd be a more fun video to explain how we do things in Canada, which is a big stupid mishmash of US Customary and Metric. I couldn't for the life of me tell you how tall I am in cm, or the distance between places in miles. I think Fahrenheit is stupid unless I'm setting my oven. I weigh myself in pounds and basically everything else in grams/kilograms. I work more or less in the construction industry and I have to use both systems at the same time, all the time- it's irritating. First floor? There is no first floor, not on my drawings! There's ground, and second. No ambiguity. Same with the date. YYYY-MM-DD only, so nobody gets confused.
It's funny I'm American Measure the small in metric and the large in our customary units I "just know" how small a cm/gram is but need to think how big/long/heavy a km/kg is
As an American, i wish the metric act had succeeded. I don't really like our measuring system, and I still get confused all the time as an adult on how different units are supposed to scale with each other.
I'm old and know the British, American, and metrics systems of measurement. Metrics are far more logical and easy to learn. For small scientific measurements, it's not surpassed.
I was taught both imperial and metric and know them both well. I have found that metric is more useful for two reasons: 1. It's units are divisible by ten - hence equations are simpler. 2. It's used on a global scale.
Virtually everyone else managed to switch to the metric system in spite of having a manufacturing industry. It's not as if the US was the only one. Here in Australia, we made tge switch while I was in school. We even changed our currency from pounds, shillings, and pence to dollars and cents. It was a bit of a pain but well worth it. Also, the US Imperial system is different to the British Imperial system when it comes to fluid measurements, and I'm not talking about cups and teaspoons. The US fluid ounce is different to the British fluid ounce. There are 20 ounces to the pint in the British system. This is why the US gallon is different to a 'real' gallon. As for temperature celcius us easy. 0-10°C is cold. 10-20 is cool. 20-30 is warm. 30-40 is hot. >40 is stinking hot.
The cost of staying with US Customaty units is often overlooked: Much effort (time and ressources) needed for conversions within the calculations (inches, feet, miles... none decimal/base 10). And prone to mistakes! More waste due to inefficient cutting... Besides, displaying metric does not mean that you have to change sizes of products -- only the displayed scales/meters need to be updated.
@@la-go-xy I was there in 1975 and I know exactly why we didn't switch. It's a very simple thing. All that hypothetical waste you're babbling about don't come close to equaling it either. If we switched it'd cost us every day in every way. You've really no idea. That's how we like it too.
@@1pcfred 1. Because I have no idea I'm asking. 2. How? ("every way" is no valid statement) 3. Very emotional, I reckon... 4. My point was to look at the cost of keeping US customary. (No statement about a cost of complete transition)
@@la-go-xy well I know what the cost of switching is because in 1975 we did switch and that's what happened then. I know how little sense it all makes. But that's how things are I suppose. Thank God for the Second Amendment. Freedom Units forever! Yes credible threats were levied against many a politician. Switch us back, or else! For the first couple of days there really wasn't a problem. But at the end of the week when a lot of folks did what they did then it was a problem. A BIG problem! Now there's pieces of the puzzle I don't have myself. What must have been said to whom. I only know what anyone around then would. What was reported in the news. That's never the whole story though. I've tried to find some record of events but I've never had any luck. I will say that 2 liter soda bottles is a fallout from it all though. Before the switch we had half gallon soda bottles. Because of course we did. Now buying soda in liters we didn't mind. It was buying something else in liters we couldn't tolerate doing. Now what do we still buy by the gallon? Fill 'er up!
The English imperial system is different from the US customs system. A US pint has more volume than a UK pint, cheers! 1 inch English pipe thread measures 33mm. 1 US inch measures 25.4 mm. In addition to inches, the US also uses millimeters in industry and the military. The 24 hour format is the military standard in the US.
@jensschroder8214 Actually it's the other way around. The US pint is 473ml and the Imperial pint is 568ml. It's even more confusing since the US pint is 16 US fl. oz. and the Imperial pint is 20 Imperial fl. oz. With the US fl. oz. = 29.6ml and the Imperial fl. oz. = 28.4ml. In Canada most bars use US pint glasses while others (usually UK/Irish inspired pubs) use Imperial pint glasses so you get bigger pints at those places 😁
A US pint is roughly 4/5 of a UK pint - 473 cc vs 568. Also, the pipe thread diameters refer to internal diameters, not the external. The inch is actually exactly the same definition in both systems (as of 1959).
@@aruak321 The U.S. liquid measures are based on powers of two. 1 gallon = [missing 2 unit which I can't recall] = 4 quarts = 8 pints = 16 cups = 32 gills = [ missing 64 unit] = 128 fl oz = 256 tablespoons = [missing 512 unit] = 1024 drams. The reason they're powers of 2 is that long ago, scales needed rare and expensive calibrated weights to let you weigh things. But if you were splitting liquid in half, you could just weigh the halves against each other until they balanced. Or if you had consistent-sized containers, just split and fill two containers until the liquid was the same height. So take a quart, divide it into two equal parts, and you have pints. Do it again and you have cups. etc. The main exception to this is 3 teaspoons to a tablespoon. The UK (Imperial) volume units went off track at some point; I'm not sure why. Their scaling is identical to the above (1 imperial gallon = 4 imperial quarts = 8 imperial pints, etc). Except 1 imperial gallon = 160 imperial fl oz. = 1280 imperial drams. So clearly something happened at some point which caused some of their units to deviate from the powers of 2 rule.
@@solandri69 Yeah that's fair, but the absolute volumes are different since the fl oz is different between the two systems and all of the higher units are based on that.
What will really blow your mind is in the US there is also 2 standards for the foot. The us international foot is equivalent to the imperial foot. How the US also has the US Survey Foot, which for all practical purposes is equivalent but when you work with coordinate systems for land development it can cause a substantial error in locating features.
As an American old enough to remember the metric attempt in the 1970s, I think the problem was too much, too soon. Instead of just changing speed limits, for example, and later changing temperatures, etc., Congress tried to switch 100% from Imperial to metric, and that was too overwhelming. Also, Americans pride themselves on NOT being like everyone else, and given the oceans on either edge of the country, we don't need to be. Yes, it's short-sighted and silly, and long past the time when we should try to become metric. Science is all metric, so students have to learn a bit anyway in school, so it wouldn't be that hard to continue its use. But for us old timers, it will always be strange, especially Celsius. My brother lives in Albania, and I always laugh when he says it's so hot out - 40 degrees - because to me, that's really cold.
Nautical miles (nm) are not an imperial hangover and nor can they ever be metricised. They are best understood as units of time, i.e. the distance the sun ‘travels’ (yes, I know it actually doesn’t!) for celestial navigation purposes. A nautical mile is standardised as 1852 metres, and is one degree of latitude. Think maths using base 60.) Mariners the world over use nautical miles and knots (nautical miles per hour) and probably always will.
The Nautical Miles was invented by divided the earth into 360 degrees longitude and latitude, 1 degree was divided into 60 minutes = 111 km / 60 minutes = 1.852 km. And aviation also used NM's and knots for speed, because the first airplane builders were shipbuilders.
As to the USA going metric...I think, and I'm sure nearly all 340 million Americans would concur, that the USA has a few more urgent matters than that one to deal with...
But that is always true. You have fallen for the "I can't do more than one thing at a time" fallacy. But I can't fault you too hard for it. It's a special American failing.
@@nixon2tube The benefits of converting have to outweigh the costs. There is zero benefit today for Americans to convert to sell meats etc in the grocery store by the Kg. If anything it will be confusing at first and will create unnecessary price increases. The same way there were price increases in EU countries in 2001 when they adopted the euro. All that just to please some people that think the US should be confirming to international standards? What’s in it for the US? What’s a standard anyway? It’s a convention and the US is large enough to use its own.
@@AB-jz9nsthe same argument goes for every other country. And yet all other countries had done it because it is a objectively better system. The fact that it's simpler, more precise, hence a better system is the reason for the change. There is no equivalence.
@@sylvaincroissant7650 What have all other countries done? Europe has always used the metric system in the past 100 plus years. Nobody says metric isn’t better but at the end of the day people understand 180 lbs as one’s weight and not roughly 90 kgs. It’s a matter of familiarity. The Brits still use stone although not officially in commerce. Why? Are they stubborn? No, it’s because they are familiar with stone for ages.
@@AB-jz9ns no. But anyway. The conversion is as hard no matter when. You would always find specific reasons that make it particularly inconvenient to do the change. Wasnt it hard for the French to invent this system from scratch, and ditch their old measures while absolutely no one else used the metric system or forced them to change, and there was no objective proof it would improve things? Wasn't it hard for Germany to convert in the 1870s, hence after its industrial revolution, and adopting a system invented by a country they had just beaten in the Franco Prussian war? Talk about a challenge. You win a war but still adopt the system of your enemy... Wasn't it hard for Australia to convert to the metric system in the 1970s? While all other countries in the anglo sphere were still using the imperial system... And none of these countries would come back afterwards. Which is a sign. Also the reason the Brits still use the stone is because they are stubborn. And this is also the reason the US drags their feet. Let's not kid ourselves here.... Everyone else who did the change also had traditions and "were used to using their former units of measurement." If anything the refusal to change, especially now that everyone else has done the change, is a proof of stubbornness.
I’m an older Canadian who retired a couple of years ago. The majority of our customers were in the U.S. and all of the drawings of products that I did for them were done in U.S. units. We also had European and Mexican customers and everything for them was in metric. I was comfortable working in both. When I had to train my young replacement he was pretty much ignorant of U.S. units and it caused a lot of problems. He even had trouble reading an imperial tape measure.
We use a complete hodgepodge here in Canada. More metric than not, especially for anything official, but imperial is thrown in quite liberally. We measure our height in feet in inches, our weight in pounds, but we drive at speeds in km/h. We use F for oven temperatures but C for weather temperatures.. My grandfather was old school. When he received a boat load of herring, he would estimate the volume in hogs-heads. The thing about imperial is that the units were generally easy to deal with, they were often tailored for the situation. This made measuring everyday things natural with numbers that were easy to handle Conversions are an enormous and error prone problem though, and that it where the metric system shines.
There was a guy on RUclips from the US who said he can't change to metric because he simply can't adapt his instincts to understand. It was really nice
He could and he already does. That guy 100% has bought hundreds of 2 liter bottles of soda in his life. If he takes some medication it's 100% in mg. Every ruler and tape measure since the 1970s at least if not earlier also has centimeters and mm on it. Every thermometer has Celsius on it.
The US could AT LEAST have set their traditional units to a value that made metric conversions easy, like many metric countries did back in the day. For example, the German pound was set to EXACTLY 500g. Basically, it could have been: 1lbs = 0.5kg 1in = 25mm 1ft = 300mm Fahrenheit and that letter can't be saved, just don't.
We did, actually, depending on what you mean by "easy." In 1959, the international inch was set to 25.4 mm, exactly. If you don't think that's easy, you should look at the old values, when the Imperial and US inches were slightly different. The international inch was actually the industrial inch, which was defined by a Swede, Carl Johansson, some years earlier. The international pound is not quite so easy, because the pound is used for serious work. When units are refined, both English and Metric, it is always a priority to minimize the change so that nobody except the metrologists knows the difference. In countries where 500g is called a "pound," that can be done only because no important work is done in pounds. It is just a term of convenience for buying food which is sold by weight. The Fahrenheit scale was also tied to Celsius in a way that makes conversion easy. That happened a very long time ago, I'm not sure where or when.
@@GH-oi2jf The intention is to calculate in your head: 500g = 1/2 kg 25 mm = 10/4 cm However, nowadays measurements are more precise than at the time France, Germany, UK... did the "adjustments".
Some countries say their numbers weirdly, several Germanic countries say the ones before the tens, meaning 25 would be "five and twenty" On top of that French numbers get really complicated when you get to 17, where they say "16 and 1" , 70 which is "60 and 10" and 97 will blow your mind. Danish numbers are based on a 20 number system where 50 is "Half third twenty", 70 is "Half fourth twenty" Fun stuff :)
17 in French is "10 and 7" pretty much everywhere as far as I know, whereas countries such as Belgium and Switzerland avoid most of the math involved in numbers above 70, unlike in France and Quebec. But yeah, the winners are the Danes for sure😂
My observation as an old USA guy, all the kids are familiar with the metric system, and I use it whenever I talk to someone--and they understand what I'm talking about. I visit Puerto Rico, which like most of the Caribbean, uses metric in many measures (gasoline in liters, road distances in kilometers)--but speed limits are still in miles/hour which makes reading road sign distances a little confusing.
A4 isn't the only size we also have B4 and C4 that is used for envelops. C5 is most common one envelop that can hold a A5 paper, or a folded A4 paper what everyone is doing. While B4 is a envelop to hold C4 envelops or magazine with a lot of pages. That's only thing I don't like of ABC sizes. Order from smallest to biggest is A C B, why? Why not A
If I recall correctly Celsius was not invented by Celsius (the scientist) but an homenage to him for being the base of the scale. Also my issue with F is that isn't linear, 100F is not double the heat of 50F, the scale is kinda exponential. C is just K (kelvin) but the 0 is set to where the water freezes, so it scales linearly.
@@samega7cattac Kelvin is yes. Well all of them are linear. I’m just saying that your issues with F equally apply to C. Unless you are saying that 100C is double that of 50C in thermal energy. We could equally create a “Felvin” scale where 0 is set to absolute zero but each increment is set to increase as much as 1F.
@@JonGretarB for that u need a stable base like K where u use other units of the same system to define ur new unit like K depends on J and a constant. If u wanted to do the same with F, it needs to be defined physically constant. Rn it's not possible with F and wasn't possible with the original C, only after C had been redefined by having K as base, C was linear.
@@samega7cattac F is defined physically constant. It’s tied to kelvin with each degree being 5/9th of C and 0 set to 459.67 °F above absolute zero. Btw I checked and that scale I talked about of course exists. Called Rankine scale.
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The A4 format is awesome. Fold the A4 sheet in half and you get A5. Fold it again and you get A6. Double the A4 format and you get A3, double again and you get A2, double and you get A1, double and you get A0. But all formats have the same length to width ratio.
French and German scientists searched for the perfect format for a long time and then found it.
That's far too logical for the U.S. But seriously, I love the A/B sized papers.
And A0 is exactly 1m^2 in size
@@joannemarkov Letter and Legal are top tier.
@@TunaBear64 i wondered where exactly that format came from since length measures aren't round at any point, but if A0 is really precisely 1m2 then that makes aperfect sense.
It would als mean that each consequent format would be 1/2^(format number)m2
So like A1 = 1/2m2, A2 = 1/4m2, A3 = 1/8m2 etc. So nice!
I can see from the perspective of a paper manufacturer or supplier the advantage, but as a consumer, whatever!
You missed the one of the most important ISO Papier features
A0 is exactly 1m2 big. So A1 is 1/2, A2 is 1/4 etc. it makes way easier to design posters, count prices and switch sizes - once designed, it fits all sizes
The formula for An papers is simple :
let A0 = 1 m^2, m is meter (i see u fellas in the state)
the Formula :
An = A0/(2^n) such as n€|N (integer).
Basically :
A1 =A0/2^1=A0/2
A4 = A0/2^4 = A0/16
Conclusion :
An is a sequence that can be infinitely small to reach 0 if n is infinitely large to reach infinity (limits notion) and vice versa.... Means the more n is bigger the smaller the paper is....
Not exactly, an A0 is 1m² indeed, but the sides are _cut_ to integer millimeters [“cut” vs “round”: you cut the non-integer part, 1.9 rounded is 2, 1.9 cut is 1], which gives you 1189×841mm; to get to the next smaller format, you cut it in half, but again _cut_ to integer millimeters, which gives you the sequence of 1189 → _841_ → 594 → _420_ → 297 → _210_ → 148 → _105_ - remember that, and you remember all the paper sizes from A0 to A6.
And in general: AN is 2^−N m² at a side ratio of 1:√2, rounded to the nearest millimetre.
If this fractionalization is so important, then why isn't it important in length measures?
Metric (base 10, actually) is evenly divisible by 1, 2, and 5. On the other hand, 12 is divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6. 16 is divisible by 1, 2, 4, 6, and 8.
Base 10 is a mistake. Base 12 or 16 is a more convenient everyday measure.
@@tonyantonuccio4748 - base 10 is a mistake??? Really? Just a hint, look at your hands and check how many fingers you have.
It's not just the military. The majority of the technical industries of the U.S. live in metric and convert when needed. During my time as an automotive engineer, that's how we did it anyway. Also, fun fact: tires sizes are an interesting combination of measurements. If a tire is 225/50R17. That means it's 225 millimeters wide, 17-inches in diameter with a 50 percent as wide sidewall to tire width ratio.
Never realized that. I think all tires use the Inch as a Diameter.
Tyre
So the measurement of monitors and tv sets. But it's not only the us .muk alsoo lives in the 18th century
Not only that. Legally the US Imperial measurements are now defined in metric ones. Or who knows really. The point is that a Inch or whatever is not 'almost' or 'close enough' 2.54cm. Not a lawyer or anything. Yet a Inch is by all meanings of the words exactly 2.54cm.
Looking it up quickly on the Googles. Since 1959 the inch has been defined officially as 2.54 cm.
It really makes it quite clear that the imperial measurements have changed ever so slightly to be based legally and realistically on metric. It is less accurate to use Pi in everyday math then convert Inches to CM. Since Inches ARE now CM's. If so a very pointless and awkward unit. We got DPI. PPI. Dots Per Inch. Pixels Per Inch. So even in the world of A4's and complete Metric tech? Inches are here to keep making things painful. 600 DPI = 236,220472441 Dots Per cm. Simply perfect!
17" wheel diameter to clarify. The outer diameter would be (225 mm * 2(0.50) /25.4) + 17" = 25.86".
Then some light truck tires don't use metric at all. Just 31x10.50 R15.
I saw on old WWII movie where Americans were approaching Paris and the sign was in km. One soldier asked another, "How many miles is that?". The 2nd said, "You multiply by 5, divide by 8 and subtract 1." The first said, "Why subtract 1?". The 2nd replied, "Because that's how far we'll have gone before you figure it out!"
When I was posted to Germany I was told to multiply the km by 6. So 10 k = 6 miles.
@@mike_skinner Mike, that would be 0.6 since a km is about 5/8 or .625 of a mile. Thanks for your service.
-Doug
1 mile equals 1.6 km.
@@dcinpa1134 5/8 is exactly what that movie example used. it is quite accurate, considering how far after the coma anything that is not a 0 shows up when you show the length of a mile in km.
@@PaulVincent-n2x One TERRESTRIAL mile is 1609 meters. One NAUTICAL mile is 1852 meters. Madness, I say. Madness. Give me metric any day - I just have to play with the comma.
I think the point is immobilism ( resistance to change )
- About the 190 countries have switched to SI at some point in the last 2 centuries.
- In 2001, most European countries have switched from their traditional currencies to Euro.
- In 1967, Sweden has switched from left to right hand driving ( no more traffic collisions than the previous weeks ).
All those changes need a personal effort of adaptation. A few days to figure out how expensive a thing is in Euro, a few weeks for elders.
...
Sweden made the change from driving on the left hand side of road as it was possible to drive directly to Norway where they drove on right hand side of road, other countries on mainland Europe also drove on right. United Kingdom and Ireland drive on left hand side of road, to reach any other country you must use a ferry or rail through tunnels.
@Brian3989 Sweden had referendum to ask the people if they wanted to change to travel on the same side as the rest of Europe, the Swedish people said no to the change, people don't like change. But a few years later, the gov decided to make the change anyway, I guess this decision made sense.
There are economic reasons for the Euro & switching sides of the road (right handed cars are more plentiful than left handed, so tend to be cheaper to get ahold of). There is no economic reason to push for the US to change measuring systems and a lot of economic reasons not to. Would it be easier for me if we were on the metric? Probably....I wouldn't need half the sockets & wrenches in my toolbox, but that's a sunk cost at this point. We science in metric. We live life in Imperial. It's really not a big deal. Cherish diversity.
@@joeldumas5861 if you actually do your homework, you will see that Europe was a complete mishmash of measurements of all kinds that you haven’t even heard of anymore! They had to standardize in order to be able to sell to each other and that pressure resulted in the invention of the metric system.
There was never such a problem on the American continent! They had imported the imperial system and used it all over without any variance! So the logic is: why mess with something that isn’t broken? And your answer is plain as day! It is still being used, and shows no sign of fading away!
Both Imperial and Metric get taught in US schools and in engineering at universities Metric is probably used more predominantly (but in industry is different matter). In terms of things that people care about on a personal level, the 12 inch foot is a more pragmatic unit than 10 centimeters. People are used to buying gasoline priced by the gallon and get perplexed when buying by the liter on trips to Canada. Same when buying a pound of steak vs steak by the kilogram (or grams). Is what people are used to and have no compulsion to change because there’s no significant advantage (one that matters). No one in US is concerned or cares about what people in other countries chose to do. If a US manufacturer needs to produce a product in Metric to suit external markets then fine - all engineers in US are entirely familiar with working with Metric. The US domestic market is rather large and so there is huge momentum to continue making products to what is desired by its inhabitants. And other countries don’t have any difficulty selling Metric products in US as Metric tools are super readily available everywhere.
At the end of the day we want our gasoline in gallons, our steak by the pound, our road distances by miles, and our land parcels by acres - has been our system since the nation’s foundation and there is no good reason to deviate away from that.
Can't wait to see The true Napoleon😂
Nope, that is one reason never to sub.
In Australia 🇦🇺 we just put both measurments on everything, then slowly phased out the imperial system.
In the US all prepackaged food and most other things are similarly labeled with both Imperial and Metric as well. Now we just need to do the second part, and phase out the Imperial system.
That's not the way I remember it and it would be setting yourself up for failure.
When Australia converted to metric in the 1970s rulers and tapes in both measures were banned.
Also, the author of this video seems to imagine that centimetres are a normal part of the modern metric system.
This is not so. It was true in the old CGS (centimetres gramme second) system but this was superseded by the SI system in the 1930s.
Now the preferred units progress in 1000s.viz: millimetres-metres-kilometres, millilitres- litres -kilolitres and grams- kilograms- tonnes.
The centimetres is not a preferred unit for most purposes in the SI system.
It involved a bit more than that. For example milk used to be sold by the pint (568 ml) now had to be sold as a quarter, half litre or litre measures. Similarly with packaged dry goods (flour, sugar etc) was standardised to half kilo or kilo packaging - not 450 or 900 gms. Butter etc is sold in 250 gms or 500 gms pockaging, not the old imperial sizes. This affected all pre-packaged goods - except for canned goods!
I think you are confusing things a bit. The metric system is set up as a 10^n system and it depends on what you are measuring. The main ones are 10^3n, but that doesn't mean 10^2, also known as centi (hundredth), isn't a normal part of the metric system. He showed it quite well in the video. It all depends on the scale, you can measure a few meter long stuff in millimeters, if you want, but the question is how precise of a measurement you need. Sometimes centimeters are good enough, so you would use them.
@@drsfsmith1603 say what you will but centimeters is what everybody uses in real life no matter what the SI units dictate, because it is a more relatable number! Nobody actually measures in millimeters!
American here. We were taught the metric system in school in the 70s and 80s, along with the Imperial system, for the big switchover that never happened. Yet we still use both. Any man with a toolbox will have both metric and imperial wrenches and sockets although the ratchets will be in imperial, 1/4", 3/8", 1/2", etc... Also truck drivers will use the 24 hour clock, keeping their logs on their home terminals time zone with appointments on the shipper or receivers time zone. I find myself constantly doing quick conversions in my head between the two and between decimals and fractions. We just use both.
In a way then, a transition has been in place for a while now, though not at official levels?
Americans by drugs in Grams, drive cars with engines in Liters and more examples. So it is just something to get used to.
Paul, I have a serious question for you (or perhaps just an observation).
Americans seem to have no problem measuring their guns, calibres exclusively in millimetres these days. You also seem fine expressing the engine capacity of your cars exclusively in litres/millilitres. I mean, guns and cars are about as American as it gets.
Also, you (not you personally) only buy and sell cocaine in grams and kilograms with no interference or legislation to do so, so your black market has long since converted to metric all by itself.
My question is not about your reluctance to use the metric system, but rather: If you tell me you weigh 175lbs, I, a Brit, who has always used imperial to express my weight, have no immediate idea how big you are. I would need to do some maths first. The reason is, I would express your weight as 12 stone 7lbs or simply twelve and a half stones. (1 stone = 14lbs).
Likewise, if I tell an American I weigh 12st 7lbs, they look at me like I'm speaking nonsense or I've just set them homework.
The thing is, if you asked my height I wouldn't say "I'm 76 inches tall" and expect you to divide 76 by 12 then work out the remainder to get 6'4". Luckily we both kept the foot as a unit of length, so we both have an instant idea of how tall 6'4" is, and no idea how tall 76 inches is. Why then did America not keep the stone? And why act like WE are ridiculous for continuing to use it when you have ditched it and only use the smaller lb?
I have heard Americans scoff at the stone as a unit, because "it sounds silly and stones are not all the same size", seemingly oblivious to the fact that feet are also fairly odd things and not all the same size.
Cheers.
@@nericsso only tires (or to be exact the rims) are still measured in inches, even in Europe.
They are always complaining about Europe not buying enough of what they produce for their liking (Have they ever checked their prices compared to the rest of the market?) If any of those items would still be in imperial sizes, fasteners etc. only, no one would buy anything of that.
Best example american cars (although almost no one in euroe imports those) they use nuts and bolts mainly in metric sizes.
Worst example, some cars of a certain age, they use a wild mix of both units fasteners...
@@emdiar6588 you know what is even more ridiculous? look up how they measures for length are defined. an inch is 1/12 of a foot. a yard is 3 foot, a mile is 5280 fot or 1750 yards.
But search the NIST documents that define how long a foot is. It is legally defined as exact 0.3048 meter (since I think 1959, before it was a little more due to some weird 1200/something of a meter value since 1793 or so.)
Volumes on the other hand to my knowledge are derived from cubic inches, with a gallon being like 231 cubic inches. a quart is, surprise, a quart of a gallon, a pint is half a quart, or 16 ounces... the omnipresent kitchen units on the other hand are something completely different.
So by definition they are using units which are a conversion from a metric defined length.
You haven't talked about the whole purpose of SI units. The fact that all units are directly related to one another, so any form of scientific or engineering calculation is very simple and straightforward.
No, SI units are not all related to one another, in the way that Metric units are all related to one another. The "second" is an S.I. unit, but it is a legacy unit. Its value is not derived from le mètre, but is simply the value (more or less) that it has always had since long before the Metric System was conceived.
@@GH-oi2jf thankyou. saved me pointing out logic
@@GH-oi2jf Dude, the SI (Systeme Internationale) IS the metric system. And a second is defined as: the time a Cesium 133 atom vibrates 9 192 631 770 times, or similar. A derived unit for sure, but readily definable, and fixed.
@@GH-oi2jf The metre was originally derived from the second as the length of a pendulum that swings once per second, as you might find in for example a grandfather clock. It is now derived from it via the speed of light.
@@katrinabryce at 299,997,... meters per second. why didn't they go all the way and make it an even 300,000,000? such a tiny difference.
In a word, all measurement systems are arbitrary, even SI,
Look at the conversion between the Watt/second and the Calorie, both SI measurements for the same thing. though that has been replaced by the Joule more recently
As an American living in the UK, the system here seems to make the least sense lol. You drive in mph, but fill your car up in liters. Things are measured in kilos, but people are usually in stone (a multiple of pounds) or sometimes lbs. Most people measure their height in feet and inches, but some people use centimeters (there is overlap, a number of people know their height in both). Celsius for temperature. Pints for beer, drink cups and the like (although the British pint is meant to be more in line with metric and thus is bigger than an American pint). Google Maps offers you the choice of showing a distance in miles or km, but most people use miles in my experience (unless you're talking about races, then it's almost always km). Most small things are weighed in grams and mL, but cookbooks have all the various imperial measurements like tablespoons and pounds, likewise you can buy cooking utensils with both systems on them. Typical bottled drinks come in liters/mL. Things are usually measured in cm/m for home improvement stuff, but you do get inches and feet occasionally and they come on the tape measures. House/room sizes are measured in square feet, but usually you get the meter conversion as well.
Long story short, it's a bit of a confusing mess 😆
@@generaledelogu1892 yeah, well, we did kind of invent the, ahem, Imperial measurement system, and only started using metric measurements in the mid 1970's to try and get into the European Common Market for some tax breaks. Metric wasn't legally required for sales of stuff by weight until the 1980's. Being born in 1970 I was the first generation to be bought up thinking in Imperial, but working in metric. Made life easier when I was working as a building surveyor in 1990. Millimetres are easier to judge and work in than hundredths and thou's of an inch! Lol
I'm guessing, but I suspect the mess was caused by government mandates. In the United States, we encouraged conversion for a time, but without mandates. Some gasoline companies tried selling gasoline by the liter, but that didn't last long, so now the US gallon is the unit everywhere. If the UK forced general conversion to liters of petrol, then of course you are stuck with it. Even if you removed the mandate, the companies would not want to change all their pumps back. The question is, why aren't road distances marked in km?
@@GH-oi2jf the only government mandate is that goods must be priced in metric, although there is no mandate saying goods cannot be sold by imperial weight, and for many years petrol was advertised in cost per gallon, as well as in litres, and food stuffs were priced on pounds and ounces as well as kilogrammes and grams. Some older family run businesses such as butchers still do this. Although most supermarkets have dropped the imperial measures these days.
the problem with inches, pounds, yards, feet and so on is that almost every significant country has their own definition of it. For example a swedish inch is not the same as a danish one or a scottish one, or a english one and so on.
At least you have the excuse that they invented the imperial system. We just stole it and stubbornly refuse to quit it.
Norway here: The map about floor numbering is a bit off. Some commercial buidings use O or U (for utgang, exit or other variants), but "ground floor" is "first floor" in all homes and houses. We even lack a word for "ground floor".
Ah okay! Thanks for the clarification.
I noticed that for Iceland, who more or less use the American system (was very confusing for me as a Central European when we were on vacation there). Interesting that it’s the case in Norway too.
Was about to mention the Norway discrepancy… Luckily, for once I read several comments before making mine - that helps… (@OP well explained!)
I ain't even know that @@astroalpha91
In the UK the same thing happens. Basically if your building has 2 floors it'd really just be the 1st floor as the ground floor & the 2nd floor for the upstairs. In a house it'd be upstairs & downstairs (I have no idea what it'd be if you had 3 floors in a house)
In Canada we use both systems also! Here's a non exhaustiv breakdown.
Temperature outside: c
Pool or oven temperature: f
Distance: km (or time)
Distance on water: nautical miles
(Miles are uses by older folks or in fixed idioms otherwise)
Your Height: feet and inches
You weight: lbs
Smaller things such as fruits: kg
Measuring smaller or objects: inches
Liquids: liters (such as water bottles and everything really)
And gallons are used for gas canisters or tanks (such as a tank that holds 100 gallons of water)
I was looking and hoping for a Canadian comment! We are so mixed up here! Even just warm temps - I know more in Fahrenheit, but cooler temps I know in Celsius. It must be due to the pool temps always being warmer!
I'm an American, and we also, for the most part, use time for distance rather than saying miles. Maybe the sheer size of the countries makes us use time instead?
@@daniel0atk maybe! That’s a good point!
The US sort of uses both systems too.
@@Libertaro-i2u yeah, using the imperial system in a scientific setting is usually seen to be pretty goofy but most of the time in everyday life, it's what we use over metric (unless you're a runner).
Australia switched over to the metric/celcius system in 1973 which was the year I started school. I sort of understand feet and inches but everything else is too complicated. The metric system is much easier to work with.
thats because its what you were taught in school. if you were taught imperial then that would seem easier. metric isnt as good as everyone who uses it would have you believe, otherwise americans would have switched already. its not a big deal.
@@StatueofGuyThinkinghow is that “not as good” when it is just… As simple as possible?
You have:
grams for weight
Metres for length
Litres for volume
That’s literally all you need to know to understand metric system, because everything else is just a prefix. And surprise surprise, the prefix is exactly the same for everything!
Kilo-gram = 1000 grams
Kilo-metre = 1000 metres
Mili-litre/metre = 1/1000 of a litre / metre
Can you instantly tell me how many inches are there in a mile? Oh, I looks like the answer is no. Can I tell you how many centimetres are there in a kilometre? Oh course I can, because centimetre is 10^-2 and kilometre is 10^3. So the answer would be 10^5.
That’s exactly the reason your country’s whole science industry switched to metric long long time ago.
@@StatueofGuyThinking, get real. I was born in 1946, and I grew up using only imperial. When our brain-dead politicians finally woke up to themselves, we changed to metric. Metric is light years ahead of imperial.
Correction it was 1970.Not 1973
The ISO standard for recording dates is YYYY-MM-DD which is being adopted by most companies that do international business. It makes it easier to sort data electronically by date this way.
ISO 8601 is a suitable standard for electronic data interchange, but not a way that any normal person would write a date on a check. There are many ways to write dates, more than a score. The essential requirement is that the date be understood in the context in which it is used.
@@GH-oi2jfWell, I am Hungarian, and we are using the YYYY. MM. DD. format both officially and privately. We might leave the year out when not important to mention.
@@GH-oi2jf I write my dates as DD MMM YYYY since it is unambiguous.
In Denmark we do not use checks anymore, and have not been using Them for a number of years. They are not valid for payments anymore. Only cash or creditcard/debit cards or pay with phone are accepted. Less Then 10% of all payments are made by cash.
@@GH-oi2jf I'm Swedish and always write dates as 2024-10-26. Not on checks though, since I haven't seen a check in the last 30-35 years and never had one in my possession.
Let’s get this man to 1,000,000 he deserves it very much!
@TexanTurtle7 is cannon the the lore
According to metric he had 1,000,000 member when he started his channel!
Think you mean 1.000.000!
@@dutchman7623- That convention is an entirely separate thing from the Metric System.
Metric appears to be a superior system, but my USA brain is embedded with countin cheeseburgers per/ bald eagle
Is that in carrying capacity or volume? Or are you actually counting how many bald eagles have been spotted with a cheeseburger?
yes
It is similar to coconuts/swallow?
@@LeopoldoGhielmettiNot enough Monty python and the holy grail references out there - and yes
Cheeseburger is a unit of energy, while bald eagle is probably a unit of luminosity.
Ironically, the one date we do use that scales up is the 4th of July
Just like Cinco de Mayo 😸
You mean Independence Day???? That is the official name of the holiday.
@@AL-T Why does America celebrate the national holiday of a country it hates?
It's to celebrate the defeat of the aliens.
@Andrew-df1dr Hell yeah! We will not go quietly into the night! We will not vanish without a fight!
I'd love to see you dig into Canada's weird habits around measurements. We use a mix of metric and imperial constantly dependent on what is measured.
came here to say this lol , so i second this
Yeah...for instance, for a very long time we tended to talk about low temperatures in Celsius and high ones in Fahrenheit. My theory about that is that the cold numbers are more impressive-sounding in Celsius and the hot ones in Fahrenheit...making it easier to complain about the weather! Lately we tend to talk about both extremes in Celsius...
@@stevetournay6103 The Brits do this too, so we probably got it from them.
Because everything is sold by pounds but it is labeled as grams.
@@teflonravager Only if the temperature goes above 100°F (38°C), which is very rare.
You are amazing! I've been subscribing for several years now and after the "big reveal" I can't believe how young you are. Very smart & talented!
World: Metric
Usa: Squared big mac's per self propelled howitzer
Hows the Howitzer - blue whale conversion going?
@@etherealbolweevil6268 Didn’t go too well when Burger King got wind of it.
millions of people in Myanmar should point out how wrong your answer is
Unless it's guns. Then it's in millimetres.
@@berlineczka Sometimes mm (e.g. 150, 120, 110, 76, 75, 30, 20, 9, 7.62, 5.56), sometimes 0.inches (e.g. 0.50, 0.45). But it is a dodgy area, given lbs (e.g. 25 pounder, 17 pounder) for artillery and gauge (12 bore, 10 bore etc.) for shotguns let alone introducing the concept of calibre. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caliber
Your haircut resembles a Napoleon hat somewhat from a distance
😂😂
Fun factor, Celsius originally had the scale the other way around. 0°C for water boils and 100°C for water freezes. But that was reversed, water freezes at 0°C.
Fahrenheit and Celsius are the same, at least at -40°C = -40°F
Except it's Centigrade and uses no degree symbol, was later renamed after Celsius-put the degree symbol is still incorrect as it is just a shifted Kelvin scale.
@@bowez9 The symbol for degrees Celsius is °C, and the degree symbol is not only correct but required because C on its own without a degree symbol is a coulomb.
@@patentleatherkicks tell that to Anders Celsius, for what good is a standard if it keeps changing.
@@bowez9 It hasn't changed for 'some' time. And the real standard is Kelvin now.
@@marcovonkeman9449 and when was the last time Fahrenheit changed?
In Canada we adopted metric when I was a child. But everything here is influenced by the USA. So we got used to different measurements. Older Canadians are used to a mixed system. Outdoor weather in celsius but inside thermostat in Fahrenheit. Body weights are still done in pounds but we shop for food in grams and kg. Speeds are km but gas mileage is often quoted in mpg. We also use am/pm. Elevators are done differently in Quebec than in the rest of Canada. Yes it is confusing.
It’s great to see the face behind the cartoon General!
When I was in school US was ready to switch to metric, hence the 2 liter soda bottle. Then came Reagan
'Then came Reagan'. Today's US in three words 😅
Thank God
Bro you act like we don't use SI at all. Calm the fuck down
Writing the dates as Month-Day-Year used to be a thing in other countries, too - though, concurrently with Day-Month-Year (which was still the most common format) and Year-Day-Month.
I'm Portuguese and I do genealogy. Well, I've come across some Portuguese documents, namely death records from the Catholic Church, where the date is written, e.g. "Fevereiro 12 e 13 do anno de 1855", i.e., "February 12 and 13 of the year 1855". I also have a photo of a pilgrimage to the sanctuary of Lourdes in 1910 or so, and the date on the photos caption is also Month-Day-Year.
But most records are definitely Day-Month-Year, though in the 17th century it was quite common to write dates as Year-Day-Month: "In the year of Our Lord of 1690, on the 22nd day of March..."
Yeah, but up to recently we wrote the month name out, so it was obvious. It's only since we had things like spreadsheets that we needed a format dd-mm-yy or whatever. Most newspapers still put the month before the day - e.g. September 13, 2024.
Canada officially uses: Year-Month-Day
@@rogink But it's funny how in the US Independence Day is "the 4th of July" and not "July, 4th"... 🤔
@@BananaBlooD9517 but Canadian English uses MM/DD, while Canadian French uses DD/MM
@@andypham1636 You're right, anglophones use MM/DD & francophones use DD/MM but the official format for Canada is YY/MM/DD.
I was a teacher in Canada for 33 years, starting in 1981, and in all that time we only taught the metric system although the imperial system had to be explained for older texts. But basically our students worked exclusively in the metric system.
Also an interesting tidbit on info people may have or not have known. When the UK went metric, the UK never changed our steel beam and column sizes for use in building structures. The notation simply changed to mm. So a UB254x146x31 beam seems random nonsense, until you convert it inches and realised that it is 10" deep (254mm) x 5" wide (146mm) and 20lb/ft (31kg/m), the round numbers make sense.
Similarly sheet materials (plywood etc) are 2440x1220 commonly, which is the old 8'x4' sheet just mashed into metric.
IMHO - the U.S. never switched to metric because the government really screwed up how it was introduced. I was about 10 when this all went down in the mid-1970's. PSAs on TV told us "the metric system is easier" but never really impressed upon as to why that is true. (Simple example: 0.75L = 750mL = EASY. Quick, how many oz. in 0.75 qt.? Um, not so easy.) But then as 4th graders we came home from school with math problems like "If Sally wants to make a cake using two cups of flour, how many mL is that?" Anyone looking to make a cake is NEVER going to measure out 473.18mL of flour. But when presented that way, it makes the metric system sound awfully complicated and convoluted. What we really needed was something akin to "Schoolhouse Rock" for adults, played during prime time TV, to introduce everything.
The United States uses Metric units in many ways. General conversion was never the objective.
24oz
What is a cup with flour, how big is the cup, how much do you put in the cup and so on and so on.
Measure it precisely so you know how much you put in.
@@Kermit198007 not sure I understand your comment but a cup is 8 liquid oz. If you're trying to precisely measure it you would use measuring cups. One liquid oz of water weighs very close to one oz, so for cooking you can also weigh 8oz instead of using measuring cups and often it's close enough.
The problem with the metric system in the US is we use already use both, and we are already more familiar with the US imperial system. So it's like learning a second language. Even if that language is easier to speak, because we learned English first, we think in English and then try to translate it over. Same applies with metric. People who use metric have a good idea of how much a liter is. But if you say liter here, instead of immediately knowing how much that is, most people think "okay a bit more than a quart.". So even though the metric system is easier as far as switching around between different units, those units do not mean much to us, and it becomes kind of an arbitrary conversion like the example OP used. I don't know how far 300 meters is, but I know how far 300 yards is, so I guess about 10% further than that
@@Kermit198007a cup is 8 fl oz. It’s like asking how big a liter is.
They started teaching us the metric system when I was in 3rd grade in the 70s. And then they just stopped. If they had continued, we would have completely adopted the metric system by now, I don't understand why they stopped.
they only taught us metric in grammar school bcos they were sposed to have it all converted by 1980...
For me it was the late 90s early 2000s and they were teaching us nothing but metric and expected us to just know the customary system in later grades. I suspect they didn't really "stop" so much as the program only covered early grades.
Most, if not all, states still teach the metric system in schools. Don't forget that there isn't a US education system, there are over fifty over them as there is one for each state, territory, DC, etc.
We have a mixed system in the USA and most people ate quite used to it. We buy our milk by the gallon and our soda by the liter. Athletes are timed in the 40 yard dash, but we run meter races. We buy our marijuana by the ounce and our cocaine by the gram. It works well for us.
Eh? We don't buy our soda by the liter. We buy it by the can. ie. a six pack or a twelve pack.
@@rayhume1971 track events are metric, etc 400m, 800m, but field used imperials, so you’d say 5’6 for a score for high jump
@@GoatTheGoat What about a 2-liter bottle?
😂😂
We don't have bottles that big, but yes our bottles are in 3/4, 1 or 1,5 liter. And cans are measured in cl (25, 33 and 50 most commonly)
Claiming that Fahrenheit is more “intuitive” is like pricing stuff in dollar is more intuitive because you know how much dollar you have to pay for a cheese burger and it’d make no sense in yen
Yeah, it’s “intuitive” for you because that’s what you’re used to
You can say the exact same thing about Celsius
@@zachv Being “intuitive” is the logic that only Americans use to defend Fahrenheit and I’ve never seen anyone doing the same for Celsius
They often claim Celsius makes more sense scientifically
@@junkvideos4527 Well you just haven't been observant enough. To begin with it's more than "just Americans" that still use F. You're just used to C so you think it's better. But for everyday use F is a better tool because it is more precise. 20ºC is cool, while 30º is quite warm. The equivalent in F is 68 and 86. The range of 18 degrees from cold to warm gives more precise info than 10 and it makes a lot of difference when someone in informed of the temp for example. You can do the same thing with 70ºF and 90F: 21ºC & 32ºC, 20 degress vs 11, about half the precision information is provided in C. If you are not used to F then you'll have trouble getting the point, but the fact is that F is simply more precise. To make the point, consider if we only used 2 degrees instead of 10, from 20 to 30...how precise would that be?
This is an endless debate. Temperature scales is how WE humans measure heat and cold, which is what Fahrenheit's scale was based on: Human tempt being set to be 100º, while Celsius based it on water. Someone else could choose another element. Kelvin based it on absolute zero, the theoretical temp where matter ceases to exist. If we were made of pure water, it would be fine but we are not. Water is just an arbitrary choice element. Salt water has a different freezing point, a lower one thankfully that Celcius could have chosen instead, or maybe some entirely other element! Kay sera-sera.... Your biases are not a tool to argue with, as they are by definition different from other people's biases.
Look. Fahrenheit uses the concept that 0 is probably the coldest you will ever experience and 100 is probably the hottest you will experience. No one ever felt the temperature of boiling/freezing water should be some special value. And celsius is a derived value as an offset to degrees Kelvin which is the metric unit for thermodynamic temperature. So if you really want to go purely metric, your typical temps ought to go between 273 and 313, not 0 to 40.
And while we're at throwing stones, you folks under metric do not use weight units correctly. Google it, the metric system unit of weight (force) is the Newton, the kilogram is the unit of mass. They are not the same thing. If you mass 100 kg on Earth, you're 100kg everywhere in the universe. But on earth you weigh 981 Newtons and on the moon, ~166 Newtons.
@@robruk3806 “0 is probably the coldest you will experience” in Europe/US, yeah
“100 is probably the hottest you will experience” in Europe/US, possibly
I can easily tell it’s fucking nonsense obviously not meant to be “intuitive” for us Asians
14:07 The East Asian date format makes more sense to me than either the American or European date formats. We do numbers in left to right descending order (i.e. thousands -> hundreds -> tens -> units) and time in descending order (i.e. hours -> minutes -> seconds), so I think it only makes sense that dates should also be written in descending order (i.e. years -> months -> days).
Programmers love the East Asian format. And if you're a programmer and a K-pop/anime fan, you use it and see it more than usual that you even use it in your daily life.
Yes for computers (and sorting) I prefer the Asian system as well. Makes sorting things a lot easier!
This is not the East Asian format but the Julian Date format that China etc use.
When Japanese speak dates it goes year month day and looks something like 2024年9月14日. So, it makes sense to write it this way. In English we say it as September 14, ,2024, so it makes sense to write it month day year
It’s also the official International standard for data storage…
Didn’t expect the shoutout, thank you! Great video!
Doing surveying, cartography, and planning for the US military, I use meters for distance, kilograms for weight, and I include Celsius wherever I can (although it's always alongside Fahrenheit for "translation"). But, the second I have to work with a contractor, the architects start throwing around their 3/16 inches and construction guys want materials converted to arbitrary quantities of pounds. Not to mention the level of confusion that is unleashed when I schedule a meeting for 1430.
Oh, forgot to mention, in a lot of cases, we even tend to write the date 13 Sept 24.
Interesting! Do you ever get them mixed up yourself since you use both?
@@General.Knowledge I have made that mistake a few times and have become very, very careful about double-checking all of my conversion math. But when I'm doing work around my own house or baking or whatnot, it's always easiest for me to keep things metric.
@mwphoenix3317 Sounds like Canada where a hodgepodge of both systems are in use 😄 Feet and inches for a person's height but centimeters, meter, kilometers for everything else... except for construction (to be compatible with the US I believe and probably historic tooling reasons). So I feel your contractor comment! Also pounds for a person's weight but grams and kilograms for pretty much everything else...
@@General.Knowledge In Canada we also often have to convert between because we use both for different things. Like Celsius for most temperatures but pool temperatures for some reason are always set in Fahrenheit... As well as some older home thermostats in Fahrenheit though all modern ones do Celsius (or have an option to switch between the two).
3/16 of an inch is almost exactly 5mm (4.76mm). International standards call for a 6mm tolerance in typical construction work however…
The ISO standard date format is YYYY:MM:DD (big-endian).
Ironically, the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) defines US customary units in metric (SI) units. That has been the practice since 1893.
And the until this year there were two different standards for inches in the U.S. - the standard inch and the survey inch…
I generally recommend using this in writing in general. It's alphabetical and unambiguous any date starting with the year can only be that.
I use the iso format everywhere.
The US month-day-year is not too strange considering it's how the dates are pronounced, makes sense to write them down as such.
@@qlum Depends, over this side of the pond we pronounce it in dd mm yyyy order, as well as write it that way.
@@qlum Well in Swedish we always used day-month (e.g. 7 May) in common use so that boils down to language more than standards. In daily speech we say ddmmyy but in letters or forms it often yymmdd, Aren't we living in wonderful world lol. Fun fact is that I still get confused of 9/11 as it means 9 november to me.
@@Tybold63 General trick to avoid confusion (works for me in NL) is this:
9/11 is 11th of september 9-11 is 9th of november
As far as I know the elevator thing is not standardized here in Brazil. It's up to the building owner or to the condominium
Don't forget us Americans getting rid of the 13th floor in tall enough buildings. Shows that there's superstition among the people that in order to sell rooms they call the 13th floor the 14th.
Fun fact: south of Tucson, Arizona, USA there is one single highway that uses kilometers instead of miles to measure distance on all the signs. Interstate 19. I have no idea why but there it is.
It was a pilot project for the US government to study before they converted all roads. I'm still waiting.
@@jthoresen Thanks!
And the signage is/has phased out . Ie when things need replaced they get updates to miles etc
@@Michael-sb8jf outdated would be a better term.
There used to be a pair of signs on I-44 outside Rolla, MO that gave the distances to St. Louis (heading east) and Springfield (heading west) in kilometers. I suspect the Feds told Missouri they had to put up some metric signs, and they figured "let's put them on the highway outside the engineering school; if anybody's going to know what a kilometer is, it's going to be those guys."
Fun fact: There are some signs on the interstates in New Mexico that are still in kilometers. They never changed it back to miles.
Fun fact 2: When I was in the US the other day, cops pulled me over and asked for my ID and drivers license. They looked at it for quite some time, and asked me which month the 15th is supposed to be in my birth date. So I had to educate them that in Yurop we write dd/MM/yyyy instead of MM/dd/yyyy
A friend who wasn't yet 21 got into a US bar using a European ID card. The bar didn't know that 5/12 isn't 12/5
Right? Like that time I educated Chinese police that 1993 wasn't a day. What a BS
14:52 Well, in Ukraine it's red and in Germany it's mixed between orange and cyan (the ground floor is sometimes called floor 0).
Kinda all of ex-soviet countries goes straight from 1. 0 is literally ground level, anywhere up or down from the floor itself should go plus or minus. The thing that drove me crazy in Israel with these zero(ground, entrance) floors which sometimes are stacked over by parking floors before actual numbers, so you look up to your meeting info which says "2nd floor" and skip the elevator waiting time to loose more of it climbing 0-P1-P2-1-2😅
The UK and Canada still use some variants of Imperial measures in some usages, often with regards to food, clothes or weight of a person. And also in the construction business I think.
In Jamaica we use imperial to measure the height or weight of a person. Saying that someone is 2 meters tall means nothing
@@Wolfiyeethegranddukecerberus17 I heard a Canadian call it; Imperial for the Personal, metric for the public.. is that similar in Jamaica
I live in the UK and I reject Imperial and I'd love to exclusively use Metric.
@@Wolfiyeethegranddukecerberus17Same in the Philippines
@@Wolfiyeethegranddukecerberus17 Same in Canada
The US is pretty well mixed. We know our US Customary Units, but have a good sense for metric measurements as well outside of temperature. Also Canada is mixed, not fully metric. Ask a Canadian how tall they are or how much they weigh. You’ll get the answer in US Customary Units.
Also go buy a TV anywhere you live. Go buy wheels on your car. Those all use US Customary units. A 55” TV is a 55” TV everywhere in the world. Your phone screen is 6 inches, etc. Your wheels are 20 inches, etc.
As for switching, it is too engrained here and we’d have to change out millions of road signs at this point. Every US Interstate or highway has mile markers and most of our exits are calibrated against the mile markers - so shifting would be a gargantuan task that would cost billions of dollars.
We also are mostly metric in our business. All our units are defined against metric units and everything is made in metric calibrated US units.
The US does *not* use the "Imperial" system (which, BTW, is not a system because there is nothing systematic in it...).
The US uses the *US Customary System* (also not a system...), which uses the same *names* as the Imperial (i.e. British) "system", but with *different measurements:* e.g. a US gallon and an Imperial (British) gallon are different quantities.
We use Freedom Units
That's true! But they're connected and share not only names but also values in a lot of units.
Plus our system is still based on Metric, we just still use ye olden ways for daily life
@@General.Knowledge But that is also misleading.
Customary is related to imperial.
The new videos with you showing yourself are a great improvement! Keep it up and keep up the good work :)
Great video - as an Australian, i find metric soooo much easier as everything is set to 10.
I would love to see you in the Napoleon outfit.
For a metric guy the imperial system is totally confusing 😢.
Actually, in the US, both systems are used in different professional situations. Medical, dental, and other scientific professions use the metric system. All of our groceries are labeled in both systems. Dairy product are sold in US customary units, but labeled with both systems, whereas soft drinks that are sold in bottles are primarily metric and still the US standard in cans. As far as paper in the engineering and architectural professions both systems are found. You showed the A sizes, but these also have B, C, D, and E sizes. The A papers set side by side make up a B size, rotate the B 90° set another along side you have the C size likewise you increase to the D size, and E size. Also, Paper sizes are similar for the US letter size. We use 8.5×11 inches, 11×17 inches 17×22 inches, 22×34 inches, and 34×44 inches. All of which we call A, B, C, D, and E respectively. Then we also have 12×18, 18×24, 24×36, 36×48 inch sizes used the later are used more often by Architects, while the engineers use the letter sixes. The real reason why the US doesn't change is the majority of the citizens don't want to change. It is the system we learned and understand and we don't want to change. If someone tells me what the temperature is in Farenheit, I know what it is, if they tell me in Celsius I have to do a math calculation and convert it to Farenheit before I know how warmer cold it is. Same for distance, weight and volume.
I'm from the US and I've taken it upon myself to switch all my personal devices to metric, 24h, and DDMMYYYY. I've never liked that we don't use metric like everyone else so I wanted to make sure I could at least understand metric.
Good luck in the UK where they use miles and stones.
@@petermsiegel573 Stones are only used informally, they're not an official measurement any more. Britain uses metric for everything, except for speed and distance road signs, beer and cider sizes, re-usable milk containers, and precious metals.
I've never understood why anyone would want to be exactly like everyone else. Diversity is our strength and all that, and yet the modern "progressives" want to make everyone completely indistinguishable.
@@hendy643I live in the UK and set my satnav to km. given I don’t use road signs for navigation anyway, I have made another part of my life metric.
How successful are you? How long have you been doing that?
Outside your own zone you still use customary, then?
10:46 While these units and conversions within US Customary, colloquially called Imperial in this video, is correct, many of the units on this graphic are not commonly used, let alone widely known any more. Hands are still used in the context of determining the height of horses, more out of tradition than anything else. Chains are still somewhat used in the context of surveying, as that was the base tool used for surveying many years ago. Leagues may still be used in some nautical circles, but I would say that the average person uses it as much as they might use score, or fortnight as a measurement in this day and age.
11:30 The reason the US cups and the rest of the British Commonwealth cups don't match up is we broke away before the UK converted their cup to be more inline with an easy conversion with metric system, moving from the previous 236.6 ml of cup to 250 ml. We retained the old measurement, while they updated.
One other note that I will say when it comes to the US Customary/Imperial systems and why so many people talk about it being more intuitive for day to day, is because, like many of the measurements metric replaced in other countries, many of our measurements are based of of human proportions and perception. 1 inch is roughly the length of the first segment of a person's thumb, and a half inch is roughly the thumb's width. A foot is roughly the length of a grown man's foot. Shocker, I know. A yard is roughly a full pace or the length of the distance from a man's fingertips to the center of his chest. As a person who works in design and construction, it's nice to be able to roughly walk something off without a tape measure or walking wheel to get ballpark measurements. Fahrenheit, though based off the internal body temperature of a horse, 100 F, lines up closely with the internal body temperature of a human, 98.6 F. So in perceiving ambient temperatures, like for weather or climate control in buildings, it's seems much more intuitive when you are fine tuning human perception by a few degrees. That being said, I will concede that metric is much better for contexts where precision is needed, in which cases, the US generally uses it, like in manufacturing, scientific applications, etc.
If you spell "Imperial" with a capital "I" that is a proper noun referring to The Weights and Measures Act of 1824 from the U.K.. The U.S. does not use the capital "I" Imperial system. Our customary system of measurements is imperial but not Imperial.
The word "customary" is *NOT* the official name of our measuring units. The word "customary" is literally just a description of our units. The word "customary" in "U.S. customary units" should not be capitalized.
Anyway, all this ridiculousness goes away once we have fully metricated.
Honestly I think it seems more "intuitive" because you're used to it and have internalized it. Canada uses a weird mix of metric and Imperial (and American standard which is often slightly different) and people in Canada have internalized the use of certain units of measure for some things and other units for other things. For example many people are used to pounds for the weight of a person, but gladly use grams and kilograms for their groceries and other things. Similarly using feet and inches for the height of a person but centimeters, meters, and kilometers for almost everything else... except for construction (probably for compatibility with the US). Yet people internalize the system that they're used to for the particular purpose and using other system for that purpose feels... odd.
@@aruak321 Exactly.
When it comes to precision. It is not the measurement system that is precise. It is the measuring instruments and the people using them. Comfortable in both US customary and SI l fully agree that SI is far more logical.
I would not opt deliberately for a world where the length of someone's thumb determined anything. Although it does explain quite a lot.
The Philippines is slowing adapting to metric measurement for paper although this makes choosing paper more confusing. Now, we have Letter, Legal, and A4.
Yeah I can imagine the transition period is a little confusing
Although I'm using a 24h time format on my laptop, phone, for work,... When I tell the time I mostly say it's 2 o'clock or 6 o'clock and based on the time of the day it's clear what's meant. Who even says it's 15:31. 😅
Me too! Exactly the same.
When I am by myself, generally I am a shortwave listener. Everything to me is in UTC.
I work in the US in an industry where 24 time format is standard... I recently switched jobs to a company that only has a small division in our industry... and having to go back to 12 hour time was a bit of a shock.
Sounds like a language thing to me. In German, just saying the equivalent of "fifteen thirty-one" has become a lot more common starting with the spread of digital clocks in the 90s.
The reason the U.S. went with what became the “customary” system today, is cause in the 1790’s when we were trying to adopt a standard weight & measurement system, the Frenchmans boat who was bringing over the metric stuff to show/demonstrate was blown off course due to a storm down to the carribean, and was attacked by what was basically British privateers…. Aka, Pirates. So we developed what became our system now.
Study more.
@@QPRTokyo don’t need to, that’s historically accurate.
And the Federal Government, in that case, preferred metric units if there was no overriding reason to use US customary units. But states were in a distrust of the new federal Republic phase, so the metric law was mainly used to decide disputes in interstate and international commerce issues. For local purposes, local units ruled.
It’s much easier to divide things like dough into 2 or 3 even amounts than 10.
Basic error from get go. America doesn’t use imperial measurements. It uses US Customary units. Both are different standardisations of ‘English units’ but imperial units are the British 19th century standardisation. British tons are slightly heavier and pints slightly larger.
From what I observed in the UK as a tourist is that they used miles on road signs for distances or speed limits (mph). Speedometers show both mph and kph.
They sell petrol (gasoline in the US) by the litre [which we spell liter]. While most commerce uses metric measures, many Brits still use pounds (and sometimes stone) to indicate their weight and use feet and inches to indicate their height. They use the Imperial pint or a yard (shorter than a meter) for beer/ale glasses. I suspect the US will switch to metric in bars before Brits give up their pints in pubs. They'll leave metric beer glasses to the Germans. They still use acres instead of hectares for measuring land areas; in the US, we do the same and unbelievably, the acre is the same in both countries.
Yeah but that’s because when the uk went metric lots of it wasn’t compulsory. It was a half arsed effort. I’m an ex pat now living in New Zealand where everything is metric. It took a little getting used to as I still worked height in feet and inches and body weight in stones but already had the grams for cooking and Celsius for temperature.
Liquor is already mostly sold in 750 mL ("a fifth", though it's actually about 1% less than an actual fifth of a gallon) or 1.75 L ("handle") bottles.
As someone who was born and still lives in the UK, I think I can explain in which way we use both “imperial” and “metric systems:
1. Roads and Transport: The UK uses imperial units for road signs, including distances (miles, yards) and speed limits (miles per hour). However, fuel is sold by the litre, and engine capacities are typically measured in litres as well. If you gave me or any other fellow Brit a distance in KM, I wouldn’t understand 😭
2. Retail and Everyday Use:
- Food and Drink: Most packaged goods display both metric (grams, litres) and imperial units (pounds, ounces), but metric is more commonly used in product labeling. Drinks in pubs are still sold in pints.
- Body Measurements: People often use a mix, with height commonly given in feet and inches, and weight sometimes in stones and pounds.
But usually, we use KG to measure body mass. Again, here in the UK, it’s very common to measure height in feet’s and inches like the USA which cm being used not so often.
3. Construction and Engineering: Metric units are generally used for measurements in construction, engineering, and scientific work. However, some traditional trades (like carpentry) still use feet and inches.
4. Education: Schools primarily teach metric units, but students are also introduced to imperial measurements to understand their usage in the real world.
The use of the A0 paper sizes is much more rational than the previous paper sizes in United Kingdom. When it comes to envelopes for posting letters there is a C size standard, so C5 takes A5 paper. Common paper sizes used to be Quarto, 10 x 8 inches or Foolscap 23 x 8 inches. Book size or poster sizes had many quirky measurements.
The US legally approved the Metric system in the 1870s. Before that Jefferson wanted to adopt it in the early 1800s. I can use either one. Metric ismore logical. Neither is more precise. Precision lies in the instrumentation. And why don't we use Metric for time and angular measurements.
For your last question i believe that most of the world already used the 12 hour clock and degrees for angles. For weight, distance and volume every town used to have their own measurement. Therefore criminals could easily scam foreigners. France tried to change the clock to metric, but time didn't need fixing because everyone knows what a minute and an hour is. Weeks and months primarily have to do with religion though. And back then everyone believed in a god
Time: year, month and day are defined by sun, moon and earth.
Were seconds defined with metric already?
There was not much left, especially if time was already globally standardized at the time...
The Radian is the SI unit for angular measurements and the preferred measurement for trigonometry & calculus - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radian
Time measurement using the same logic as the metric has been tried in France during the French Revolution. 1 day = 10 hours. 1 hour = 100 minutes. A year = 12 monthes. A month = 30 days + 5 or 6 additional days to fit the 365 days cycle. A week = 10 days. Add to this new months names and new way to count the years
This was legal from 1793 to 1800. The law was published on 24 November 1793, using the French Revolutionnary Calendar : 4 frimaire an II.
Link to the French wikipedia page about Decimal Time, you'll see a nice pic of a decimal clock from 1795 : fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temps_d%C3%A9cimal_en_France
Fahrenheit is more accurate than Celsius if you limit yourself to expressing temperatures as whole numbers. At most you'll be off by half a degree, but half a Fahrenheit degree is less than half a Celsius degree.
I attended elementary school in the late 1970s - when the U.S. was actively trying to switch to metric. So I was taught (and still use) both systems. Those of us who grew up in that peculiar time probably have the best handle on the advantages and disadvantages for both systems. I prefer metric in most cases, but there are a few instances where Imperial units just work better.
12 inches in a foot is divisible by 2, 3, 4, 6 and still yield integers. 10 cm in a dm is only divisible by 2 and 5. If you want to divide a dm (or even a meter) by 3, you get a repeating fraction. Meaning it's impossible to do it precisely. You have to adjust the larger structure to be (say) 90 cm instead of 1 meter if you want to divide it into 3 equal parts. Which defeats some of the advantage of everything being divisible by 10.
1 degree Farenheit is pretty close to the smallest temperature change you can feel. In the U.S., you can adjust the temperature on car and house thermostats by increments of 1 degree F. In the rest of the world, they have to kludge it so you can adjust it in increments of 0.5 degrees C.
Farenheit tried to make human body temperature 100 F but he had a badly calibrated thermometer. Aside from that hiccup, body temperature is consistent unless you're sick. So you always know where 98.6 F is. OTOH, 100 C being the boiling point of water is not as useful a static benchmark since the boiling point varies with altitude (atmospheric pressure).
If you travel at 60 mph (moderate highway speed), you travel 1 mile per minute. Makes it really easy to estimate how many more minutes of highway travel you have left if you have x miles to go. Highway speed in metric is about 100 km/h, which is 1.6666 km per minute. So it's not as handy for estimates.
(Likewise, there are lots of places where metric just works better. e.g. It's set up so 1 liter = 1 kg of water, which makes estimating liquid weights easier. I'm not trying to say Imperial is always superior. Just that there are cases where it works better.)
For the mph one, I think it's a coincidence. The other 2 are deliberate choices which are good.
@@solandri69 I was brought up in the UK in the 1970's. I think Imperial, work metric. It only seems to be the last generation or so over here who actually think in metric. I was born the year before we officially decimalised our currency, you should have seen it before, what was it...12 pennies to the shilling, 20 shillings to the pound, or 21 to the guinea.... probably about half a dozen coins and six or 7 notes. Of course, the simpler they made the currency, up went the prices. Less division of value.
Usual highway speed in Europe is around 120 km/h (100 - 140/unlimited), that's 2 km per minute, so what?
60 mph are 1 mile per minute, that's 1.618 km. Tell me, that's better than 5/3 km = 1.667 km in one minute.
We are all calculating in the decimal system, except minutes and seconds (60) as well as hours (24/12) etc.
Fahrenheit is the most insane unit. Why do you follow the measurements of Liberia? At least you personally are trained in both systems, so you understand the rest of the world and science. And if not, some vehicle crashes on the face of Mars... LOL
I always thought the argument that 0°C is freezing and 100° is boiling to be the strangest argument to recommend the system. Who sticks to thermometer in water to tell if it’s frozen or boiling you look at it; if it’s hard it’s frozen; if you heat it until it bubbles, it’s boiling. You don’t stick a thermometer in to check that. On the other hand, a scale where 0° and 100° are temperatures that you can understand because you’ve experienced them seems very practical. Having grown up in the 70s and frequently using things like centimeters, liters/milliliters and grams in my day-to-day life, depending upon what task I was doing, I’ve easily been able to integrate those into my brain. But Celsius just never came to me I can’t take some thing that’s already an abstraction, temperature turning into a feeling, and then be able to convert that to a whole different scale.
@@pjschmid2251 It's the other way round: When the water boils, I know, it's 100°C without any tool like a thermometer. When water freezes, it's around 0°C. Both values with a certain tolerance (because of presure, salt, and other paremeters), but it works good as an estimate. When it's snowing and doesn't melt, I can estimate, that it's 0°C outside, all without needing a thermometer. It's quite helpful to bind these values on visual changes of the state of aggregation of that water.
And no, I'm not putting a thermometer into water to see if it boils over! What an idea to do!
"Leave it to the Germans to come up with the most efficient way to fold a Piece of Paper", yes, i managed the Art of folding any Paper Size into A4. Learnt it in school :P and i will inherit that knowledge to my Apprentice soon.
Darth Metric
Actually, it is using both systems simultaneously. For auto fasteners, a lot are metric. For construction, most buildings are based on 4’ x8’ panels, and what is evenly divisible into them. For ammunition reloading, most weight measures are in grains, the old pharmacists measurement. Plus, there is a great deal of incumbency, like qwerty keyboards.
10:30 Please don't fall into the "accuracy/precision" trap. Precision is how finely divided and perceptible it is. Accuracy is adherence to, or the amount of devation from, a standard. So if your inch (or centimeter) is too big or too small, it is inaccurate. If you're measuring something to the nearest mm, it's more precise than if you measure it to the nearest cm.
As an American ... When I was in school studying science, I couldn't understand why the US didn't switch to metric. As you scale up and down, it's trivial to conver from meters to kilometers. Not so easy to convert from feet to miles. It's easy to convert from cubic centimeters to liters. Not so easy to convert from cubic inches to gallons. Etc. then I graduated and got a job that did not involve science. And suddenly the advantages of metric evaporated. In my daily life, I almost never need to convert miles to feet, etc. the advantages are trivial compared to the nuisance of learning a new system, and the expense of replacing so many tools.
Now I live in the Philippines, which is mostly metric. I'm struggling to get a feel for just how heavy a kilogram is, just how hot 25 degrees is, etc. (what makes it worse is that the Philippines occasionally uses American measurements. So like, my wife and I were just buying drapes. I measured all our windows in cm. Then we got to the store and all the drape were labeled in inches! Arrgh!)
Why would you have to convert feet to miles? Give me a practical reason for doing so. When do you do that? Originally a mile was 1,000 marching paces. Mile = mille or 1,000 steps. Now there's some practical metric for ya. It was how Rome conquered the known world.
No reason to.
The formula converting F to C and/or vv, reveals through the fraction “5/9” that every two degrees F is about a degree C. This is a major obstacle in convincing users of Fahrenheit that Celsius is better because there is more variation in temperature numbers that give more information in Fahrenheit.
To illustrate, 10C = 50F & 30C= 86F. So the difference of 20 degrees C is equivalent to 36 degrees F! That’s a lot more temperature information provided by F. In Celsius, 20 is cool while 30 is warm. 10 degrees is too little differentiation to provide enough temperature information for those of us used to Fahrenheit. C just feels like a coarser measurement system . For the record, I have spent roughly equal amounts of time in countries using both, so I can speak with living experience of both.
No problem for people who use the metric system.
As a kid I learned e.g. :
When you drive to the mountains it gets colder 0.5 °C any 100 m you gain altitude.
So when you live at 200 m above sea level and it's 2°C outside in winter take your car (driven by the parents off course) and go to the nearest montain resort at 900 m. There it will be -1.5°C and snow will not melt away. So you can take your sledge with you and enjoy a day in winter wonderland....
@@zeisselgaertner3212 You live in an amusingly vertical world! I wonder what you do with your "sledge"! 🙂
.... sliding downhill.
And yes. From the Großer Feldberg (translates to Grand Field-Mountain) you have a gorgeous view over Frankfurt, Germany.
Celsius is fine enough. You would be hard pressed to tell the difference between 67 and 68 F. If you want it finer, you can always go for 0.5C steps. But usually other factors matter more when determining how cold/warm it is, like is there any wind or does the sun shine (temperature is given in shade). It certainly affects my decisions more when I try to find out what to wear in my next cycling trip…
@@adamkormendi5904
I can confirm. 25 °C with no wind at all feels hot and sticky.
25 °C and a mild wind makes you feel comfy and refreshened.
The US does use metric in government, medicine, and industry (mostly). Public (government organizations) always use metric. The law that made it so does not force private entities to use it. That’s why we’re not metric oriented.
No when the government tried to switch us we threatened the lives of every politician. Being an armed populace they took our threats quite seriously. You've no idea what happened then if you weren't there. I was there so I do know. I ain't saying now either. Because I benefit every day from us not using metric. Every American does.
@@1pcfredwow i can see how you benefit a lot from having to use a calculator to convert between measurements
@@DiggyPT I'm glad you can see how obfuscation has its benefits. Because most can't be asked to do those conversions. So we can cheat them. We do too. All the time. If you're a foreigner we're cheating you right now. Cheating you out of trillions of dollars. You sucker! Hehe! Now excuse me while I laugh all the way to the bank.
All ASTM standards are nowadays in the SI-system, some times with US system in brackets. All international industries also use the SI-system. It is time for US to change.
It can be done gradually as they did in UK with temperatues. First they started to show the Celcius temperature in brackets on the weateher maps for some years, the they changed to have the Fahrenhiet in brackets for some years and finally they deleted the Farhremheit. regards from Sweden, the land of Celcius.
The date thing is because we say "June 30th" in speech. So you use the months first as it matches natural speech patterns. That isn't to say there aren't times when you might say the 30th of June, but it's probably less common.
And the month is at the top of the calendar.
As a US kid in teh 1970s I remember spending about 6 yeas leaning both systems because we were supsoed to be converting to metric. Ronald Regan getting elected president is why the program ended. if Jimmy Carter had been re-elected I believe the conversion would have continued.
For the record we are exposed to metric here every ruler has inches and centimeters/millimeters, every thermometer also has Celsius. Our large bottles of soda have been 2 liters since the late 70s. No one here has an issue with this. Most single serving bottles of water are 1/2 liters. Our medicine is typically in milligrams. Our food has the weight listed in both oz/lbs and grams/kg. My can of Pringles says 5.5 ounces( 158 grams ). While our cars odometers are still in imperial the speedometers have both MPH and KMPH. Our clocks can be set for either 12 hours or 24 hours. And for the record no one says 9 PM is 21 o'clock. even in other English speaking countries. So the 12 hours system is better since it's the way people speak.
Also our date system is better A) it's the way we say the dates. B) Also easier to organize. If you're creating a file system are you putting all the 26ths of the month in one folder? And have 31 different folders with each folder containing 12 months? No you have MONTH folder filled with each day that month become it makes sense. If I show you the first 2 digits of a date in your system and it's say 08. Well that could be anywhere from Jan 8th to Dec 8th. In the US system you automatically know its August. I've narrowed down the exact date to a range of 31 days instead of 335 days
Mostly true, as a fellow US citizen, I use 24 hour time, but majority of the population uses 12 hour time and only the US Military uses 24 hour time giving to reason why most US citizens call it "Military time"…
@@jescis0 So if it's 9 PM you say 21 o'clock so people don't know WTF you are talking about? Even in places like the UK they'll say 21:00 as 9 o'clock so why not have that way on the damn clock?
@harryballsak1123 no I say 2100 hours for 9 PM, it's not complicated and I had desire to join the Military because of my family and the only reason why I wasn't accepted was because I was born with epileptic seizures and Cerebral Palsy… plus it's my choice to use 24 hour time, though for others that don't know it as well as I do, I say 9 PM or 9 O'clock…
@@jescis0 most people would look at you weird
@harryballsak1123 like they don't already?? What would be the difference?? If God made everyone the same, what would be the point??
As a British person it really annoys me when my countryman pretend only Americans use imperial. Despite the fact the vast majoriry of people use it here for many things
Why the fuck so you people use stone for bodyweight specifically what is wrong with your culture
Pretty sure Canada is also kinda mixed, but hey, it's all about shitting on the US and our backwards ways
I buy petrol in litres but drive for miles. It keeps my brain functioning trying to work out how many miles per gallon my car does :)
In Canada we use imperial measurement for the human body & food but officially we use metric.
You also use stones for weight measurement. I have tried to memorize how it works but I find it impossible
As an American I fully support the conversion to the metric system… uhhh I mean, WHAT THE F*** IS A KILOMETER!!!!!!
1000 meters dude.
Whenever I run marathons or race in triathlons abroad I can never convert distances in my head during the event; I’m too accustomed to miles. It really messes with my head throughout the event especially since signage doesn’t include mileage in smaller print.
@@FelonFitnessI don’t even think in miles because the measurements are all over the place. In meters it’s easy because everything is in 10s.
I dunno. A kilometre is a measure of distance. Maybe it's just one of those spelled wrong?😁
UK Here-
As a millennial- it’s gotten allot more straight forward in the UK as the metric system is exclusively taught in schools now. My parents still use some of the old measurements whereas I do not. Transportation is where the old measurements are still standard.
Non exhaustive list of what I use in the UK- I will reffer mostly to the master unit but we use the metric smaller units when It makes sense.
Outside Temperature: Celsius
Cooking: Celsius (With the exception of BBQ where I use American Recipes)
Weight of a person: KG
Smaller weights: Grams
Height of a person: Meters (Although feet and inches is still fairly common)
Measurements (DIY): Meters
Distance (Sports) - Meters
Volume of a Liquid- Litres
Transportation is where the old measurements are still the staples:
Speed- MPH
Distance- Miles and Yards
Tyre Pressure- PSI
Fuel Economy- MPG (UK Gallon)
Fuel Volume- Litres
You want to know which bits of the metric system we (Britain) use? Mostly metric, personally I think we should go full metric. Beer is still in pints, but most other pub measures (wine & spirits) are metric. The major one we still need to change is roads.
People still usually do their heights in ft & inches, and weight in stone & lb. I've started doing my weight in kg and when I tell people what it is nobody asks what it is in stone.
Stay mixed. Uniformity is overrated.
A4 size papers look more professional
For me as a European, I know, that 1000 meters is a kilometer, pretty simple, but goodness knows how many feet in a mile. The imperial system is just confusing as hell. If the US would switch to metric, collaboration between international teams would be much easier.
How often do you need to know that?
Conversion calculators are only a quick Google search away on your phone.
Metric is already used in science and engineering in the US.
@ It’s mostly irrelevant.
It's 5,280 feet per mile. It is easy to convert. If you can't figure out how to convert back and forth easily then I can say with confidence that you are not an engineer.
9-11, the terror date helps me to remember how to write a specific date in the US, because it is also the phone number for emergency
In my own data i write everything in the "China"-format for an easier sequence system
it's only system which sort date as text corectly.
Missing the most important features - The aspect ratio of the DIN format series A, B and C is 1∶√2 and you just can get the next smaller size by folding the longest side into half. If you fold A4 you get A5 and if you fold A5 you get A6 and so on. It works in the other direction too. Two A4 sheets are the size of one A3 sheet...
DIN B represents the untrimmed printed sheet formats and is therefore suitable as packaging for the corresponding DIN A formats. This is why folders, binders and mailing envelopes are produced in DIN B. B5 and B6 are also popular formats for books.
DIN C is the standard format for envelopes that only can hold a few sheets, for more you get a Din B envelope. DIN C5/C6 is the standard size for business mail. And only a few realize there is a DIN D, too. It is rare that Din D is used, but we all know something that uses DIN D and that is the DVD case that is DIN D5.
Great video as always. Here in Malaysia, in school we only learn the metric systems. Only in higher ed levels we encounter imperial systems. But in individual households old people still use imperial units here and there (except Fahrenheit, we phased that out completely lol) and the young ones pick up on those and used them occasionally.
And GK, another thing I don't mean to pick on you, but just slight correction about reading numbers after decimal point. Numbers after decimal are pronounced digit by digit. For example 2.54 is pronounced *_"two point five four",_* and not _"two point fifty four"._ It doesn't make sense to pronounce 2.540 as _"two point five hundred forty"_ even though it's identical to 2.54. Hope that helps. Thanks for the great content!
Pirates...
That's right, pirates!
The US does NOT use the imperial measurement system. This is a common misconception. The US uses the US customary measurement system. While many of the measurements are the same or very similar to the imperial system, some are quite different, particularly in the volume measurements. An imperial pint is not the same as a US pint nor is an imperial gallon the same as a US gallon. Also, the US does use the metric system. It just doesn’t use it exclusively, nor do people use it commonly in their every day tasks. But businesses and science largely use the metric system, as does the US government.
Actually when Great Britain adopted the standard inch they also abolished the Imperial system. That happened in 1958. The archaic Imperial inch was 2 millionths shorter than a standard inch is.
Where US units differ from Imperial, the American ones are generally the older. Similar to once-British words such as 'gotten', 'soccer', and 'fall' (for autumn).
@@kenaikuskokwim9694 The story of the Standard inch varies depending on the source but the Standard inch in use today is not the old Imperial nor is it the old US inch either. Although looking at three of them you couldn't tell any of them apart by eye or even with fairly common instruments. They're only separated by millionths of parts from each other. Which is where a lot of the confusion stems from. Being as no one can see any of the differences easily they assume it's all the same.
@@1pcfredthe process of replacing the Imperial inch with the 25.4mm standard/international/metric inch throughout the British Empire started in the 1930s.
Around the same time the US stared changing from the US Customary inch to the same standard of 25.4mm.
@@markevans2294 that's the story I heard the other day. Previously I'd heard things differently though. I wasn't there as it all happened before my time so I can't tell you. What I can tell you is that Ford bought Johansson and moved him to Ann Arbor Michigan. So we got the goods.
It'd be a more fun video to explain how we do things in Canada, which is a big stupid mishmash of US Customary and Metric. I couldn't for the life of me tell you how tall I am in cm, or the distance between places in miles. I think Fahrenheit is stupid unless I'm setting my oven. I weigh myself in pounds and basically everything else in grams/kilograms. I work more or less in the construction industry and I have to use both systems at the same time, all the time- it's irritating. First floor? There is no first floor, not on my drawings! There's ground, and second. No ambiguity. Same with the date. YYYY-MM-DD only, so nobody gets confused.
It's funny
I'm American
Measure the small in metric and the large in our customary units
I "just know" how small a cm/gram is but need to think how big/long/heavy a km/kg is
Medioeval is the name on all non metric standard tools and screws, in my shop
In Spain we use both 24 and 12 hour systems, manly 24 when writing and 12 went speaking
The date is probably from looking at a physical calendar. You want to know if you are in the right month first before finding the day.
You must first find the right calendar, i.e. based on your logic, so therefore it must be the year first.
@Ikkeligeglad for most people, they only need to know the year once to get a calendar. Most are not ask "what year is it?"
@@shermanmesser6189 I have been to a company where there was someone who tried to use the same calendar again after New Year🤣
@@Ikkeligeglad 🤣🤣 I haven't heard someone try that in a long time.
@@shermanmesser6189 He was 19 years old and was teased about it for a long time🤣
People using US paper in the Caribbean strictly because it's cheaper to get it to their countries....
As an American, i wish the metric act had succeeded. I don't really like our measuring system, and I still get confused all the time as an adult on how different units are supposed to scale with each other.
I'm old and know the British, American, and metrics systems of measurement.
Metrics are far more logical and easy to learn.
For small scientific measurements, it's not surpassed.
I was taught both imperial and metric and know them both well. I have found that metric is more useful for two reasons: 1. It's units are divisible by ten - hence equations are simpler. 2. It's used on a global scale.
Australia changed its currency and measurement systems in the 60s-70s. I grew up with the old system but had no problem changing.
Naming their paper size standard after themselfs is such a US thing...
That is also true if DIN paper sizes (Deutsches Institut für Normung).
It’s just called letter stock in the US.
Virtually everyone else managed to switch to the metric system in spite of having a manufacturing industry. It's not as if the US was the only one.
Here in Australia, we made tge switch while I was in school. We even changed our currency from pounds, shillings, and pence to dollars and cents. It was a bit of a pain but well worth it.
Also, the US Imperial system is different to the British Imperial system when it comes to fluid measurements, and I'm not talking about cups and teaspoons. The US fluid ounce is different to the British fluid ounce. There are 20 ounces to the pint in the British system. This is why the US gallon is different to a 'real' gallon.
As for temperature celcius us easy. 0-10°C is cold. 10-20 is cool. 20-30 is warm. 30-40 is hot. >40 is stinking hot.
The cost of staying with US Customaty units is often overlooked:
Much effort (time and ressources) needed for conversions within the calculations (inches, feet, miles... none decimal/base 10). And prone to mistakes! More waste due to inefficient cutting...
Besides, displaying metric does not mean that you have to change sizes of products -- only the displayed scales/meters need to be updated.
@@la-go-xy I was there in 1975 and I know exactly why we didn't switch. It's a very simple thing. All that hypothetical waste you're babbling about don't come close to equaling it either. If we switched it'd cost us every day in every way. You've really no idea. That's how we like it too.
@@1pcfred
1. Because I have no idea I'm asking.
2. How? ("every way" is no valid statement)
3. Very emotional, I reckon...
4. My point was to look at the cost of keeping US customary. (No statement about a cost of complete transition)
@@la-go-xy well I know what the cost of switching is because in 1975 we did switch and that's what happened then. I know how little sense it all makes. But that's how things are I suppose. Thank God for the Second Amendment. Freedom Units forever! Yes credible threats were levied against many a politician. Switch us back, or else! For the first couple of days there really wasn't a problem. But at the end of the week when a lot of folks did what they did then it was a problem. A BIG problem! Now there's pieces of the puzzle I don't have myself. What must have been said to whom. I only know what anyone around then would. What was reported in the news. That's never the whole story though. I've tried to find some record of events but I've never had any luck. I will say that 2 liter soda bottles is a fallout from it all though. Before the switch we had half gallon soda bottles. Because of course we did. Now buying soda in liters we didn't mind. It was buying something else in liters we couldn't tolerate doing. Now what do we still buy by the gallon? Fill 'er up!
The English imperial system is different from the US customs system.
A US pint has more volume than a UK pint, cheers!
1 inch English pipe thread measures 33mm. 1 US inch measures 25.4 mm.
In addition to inches, the US also uses millimeters in industry and the military.
The 24 hour format is the military standard in the US.
US milliliters are used for cosmetics and medicine.
In addition to gallons, a liter is often stated on containers.
@jensschroder8214 Actually it's the other way around. The US pint is 473ml and the Imperial pint is 568ml. It's even more confusing since the US pint is 16 US fl. oz. and the Imperial pint is 20 Imperial fl. oz. With the US fl. oz. = 29.6ml and the Imperial fl. oz. = 28.4ml. In Canada most bars use US pint glasses while others (usually UK/Irish inspired pubs) use Imperial pint glasses so you get bigger pints at those places 😁
A US pint is roughly 4/5 of a UK pint - 473 cc vs 568. Also, the pipe thread diameters refer to internal diameters, not the external. The inch is actually exactly the same definition in both systems (as of 1959).
@@aruak321 The U.S. liquid measures are based on powers of two. 1 gallon = [missing 2 unit which I can't recall] = 4 quarts = 8 pints = 16 cups = 32 gills = [ missing 64 unit] = 128 fl oz = 256 tablespoons = [missing 512 unit] = 1024 drams.
The reason they're powers of 2 is that long ago, scales needed rare and expensive calibrated weights to let you weigh things. But if you were splitting liquid in half, you could just weigh the halves against each other until they balanced. Or if you had consistent-sized containers, just split and fill two containers until the liquid was the same height. So take a quart, divide it into two equal parts, and you have pints. Do it again and you have cups. etc. The main exception to this is 3 teaspoons to a tablespoon.
The UK (Imperial) volume units went off track at some point; I'm not sure why. Their scaling is identical to the above (1 imperial gallon = 4 imperial quarts = 8 imperial pints, etc). Except 1 imperial gallon = 160 imperial fl oz. = 1280 imperial drams. So clearly something happened at some point which caused some of their units to deviate from the powers of 2 rule.
@@solandri69 Yeah that's fair, but the absolute volumes are different since the fl oz is different between the two systems and all of the higher units are based on that.
What will really blow your mind is in the US there is also 2 standards for the foot. The us international foot is equivalent to the imperial foot. How the US also has the US Survey Foot, which for all practical purposes is equivalent but when you work with coordinate systems for land development it can cause a substantial error in locating features.
As an American old enough to remember the metric attempt in the 1970s, I think the problem was too much, too soon. Instead of just changing speed limits, for example, and later changing temperatures, etc., Congress tried to switch 100% from Imperial to metric, and that was too overwhelming. Also, Americans pride themselves on NOT being like everyone else, and given the oceans on either edge of the country, we don't need to be. Yes, it's short-sighted and silly, and long past the time when we should try to become metric. Science is all metric, so students have to learn a bit anyway in school, so it wouldn't be that hard to continue its use. But for us old timers, it will always be strange, especially Celsius. My brother lives in Albania, and I always laugh when he says it's so hot out - 40 degrees - because to me, that's really cold.
Nautical miles (nm) are not an imperial hangover and nor can they ever be metricised. They are best understood as units of time, i.e. the distance the sun ‘travels’ (yes, I know it actually doesn’t!) for celestial navigation purposes. A nautical mile is standardised as 1852 metres, and is one degree of latitude. Think maths using base 60.)
Mariners the world over use nautical miles and knots (nautical miles per hour) and probably always will.
The Nautical Miles was invented by divided the earth into 360 degrees longitude and latitude, 1 degree was divided into 60 minutes = 111 km / 60 minutes = 1.852 km.
And aviation also used NM's and knots for speed, because the first airplane builders were shipbuilders.
As to the USA going metric...I think, and I'm sure nearly all 340 million Americans would concur, that the USA has a few more urgent matters than that one to deal with...
But that is always true. You have fallen for the "I can't do more than one thing at a time" fallacy. But I can't fault you too hard for it. It's a special American failing.
@@nixon2tube The benefits of converting have to outweigh the costs. There is zero benefit today for Americans to convert to sell meats etc in the grocery store by the Kg. If anything it will be confusing at first and will create unnecessary price increases. The same way there were price increases in EU countries in 2001 when they adopted the euro. All that just to please some people that think the US should be confirming to international standards? What’s in it for the US? What’s a standard anyway? It’s a convention and the US is large enough to use its own.
@@AB-jz9nsthe same argument goes for every other country. And yet all other countries had done it because it is a objectively better system.
The fact that it's simpler, more precise, hence a better system is the reason for the change. There is no equivalence.
@@sylvaincroissant7650 What have all other countries done? Europe has always used the metric system in the past 100 plus years. Nobody says metric isn’t better but at the end of the day people understand 180 lbs as one’s weight and not roughly 90 kgs. It’s a matter of familiarity. The Brits still use stone although not officially in commerce. Why? Are they stubborn? No, it’s because they are familiar with stone for ages.
@@AB-jz9ns no. But anyway. The conversion is as hard no matter when. You would always find specific reasons that make it particularly inconvenient to do the change.
Wasnt it hard for the French to invent this system from scratch, and ditch their old measures while absolutely no one else used the metric system or forced them to change, and there was no objective proof it would improve things? Wasn't it hard for Germany to convert in the 1870s, hence after its industrial revolution, and adopting a system invented by a country they had just beaten in the Franco Prussian war? Talk about a challenge. You win a war but still adopt the system of your enemy...
Wasn't it hard for Australia to convert to the metric system in the 1970s? While all other countries in the anglo sphere were still using the imperial system...
And none of these countries would come back afterwards. Which is a sign.
Also the reason the Brits still use the stone is because they are stubborn. And this is also the reason the US drags their feet. Let's not kid ourselves here.... Everyone else who did the change also had traditions and "were used to using their former units of measurement." If anything the refusal to change, especially now that everyone else has done the change, is a proof of stubbornness.
I’m an older Canadian who retired a couple of years ago. The majority of our customers were in the U.S. and all of the drawings of products that I did for them were done in U.S. units. We also had European and Mexican customers and everything for them was in metric. I was comfortable working in both. When I had to train my young replacement he was pretty much ignorant of U.S. units and it caused a lot of problems. He even had trouble reading an imperial tape measure.
We use a complete hodgepodge here in Canada. More metric than not, especially for anything official, but imperial is thrown in quite liberally. We measure our height in feet in inches, our weight in pounds, but we drive at speeds in km/h. We use F for oven temperatures but C for weather temperatures..
My grandfather was old school. When he received a boat load of herring, he would estimate the volume in hogs-heads.
The thing about imperial is that the units were generally easy to deal with, they were often tailored for the situation. This made measuring everyday things natural with numbers that were easy to handle Conversions are an enormous and error prone problem though, and that it where the metric system shines.
There was a guy on RUclips from the US who said he can't change to metric because he simply can't adapt his instincts to understand. It was really nice
He could and he already does. That guy 100% has bought hundreds of 2 liter bottles of soda in his life. If he takes some medication it's 100% in mg. Every ruler and tape measure since the 1970s at least if not earlier also has centimeters and mm on it. Every thermometer has Celsius on it.
The US could AT LEAST have set their traditional units to a value that made metric conversions easy, like many metric countries did back in the day.
For example, the German pound was set to EXACTLY 500g.
Basically, it could have been:
1lbs = 0.5kg
1in = 25mm
1ft = 300mm
Fahrenheit and that letter can't be saved, just don't.
We did, actually, depending on what you mean by "easy." In 1959, the international inch was set to 25.4 mm, exactly. If you don't think that's easy, you should look at the old values, when the Imperial and US inches were slightly different. The international inch was actually the industrial inch, which was defined by a Swede, Carl Johansson, some years earlier.
The international pound is not quite so easy, because the pound is used for serious work. When units are refined, both English and Metric, it is always a priority to minimize the change so that nobody except the metrologists knows the difference. In countries where 500g is called a "pound," that can be done only because no important work is done in pounds. It is just a term of convenience for buying food which is sold by weight.
The Fahrenheit scale was also tied to Celsius in a way that makes conversion easy. That happened a very long time ago, I'm not sure where or when.
@@GH-oi2jf The intention is to calculate in your head:
500g = 1/2 kg
25 mm = 10/4 cm
However, nowadays measurements are more precise than at the time France, Germany, UK... did the "adjustments".
Some countries say their numbers weirdly, several Germanic countries say the ones before the tens, meaning 25 would be "five and twenty"
On top of that French numbers get really complicated when you get to 17, where they say "16 and 1" , 70 which is "60 and 10" and 97 will blow your mind.
Danish numbers are based on a 20 number system where 50 is "Half third twenty", 70 is "Half fourth twenty"
Fun stuff :)
17 in French is "10 and 7" pretty much everywhere as far as I know, whereas countries such as Belgium and Switzerland avoid most of the math involved in numbers above 70, unlike in France and Quebec.
But yeah, the winners are the Danes for sure😂
@@DanDroidzso it is in Spanish as well.
Quatre vingt dix sept? Been a while since I took French.
My observation as an old USA guy, all the kids are familiar with the metric system, and I use it whenever I talk to someone--and they understand what I'm talking about. I visit Puerto Rico, which like most of the Caribbean, uses metric in many measures (gasoline in liters, road distances in kilometers)--but speed limits are still in miles/hour which makes reading road sign distances a little confusing.
A4 isn't the only size we also have B4 and C4 that is used for envelops.
C5 is most common one envelop that can hold a A5 paper, or a folded A4 paper what everyone is doing.
While B4 is a envelop to hold C4 envelops or magazine with a lot of pages.
That's only thing I don't like of ABC sizes. Order from smallest to biggest is A C B, why?
Why not A
If I recall correctly Celsius was not invented by Celsius (the scientist) but an homenage to him for being the base of the scale.
Also my issue with F is that isn't linear, 100F is not double the heat of 50F, the scale is kinda exponential.
C is just K (kelvin) but the 0 is set to where the water freezes, so it scales linearly.
When phrased like that then Celsius is not linear. I.e 100 is in no way “double” of 50.
@@JonGretarB Kelvin is linear, it measures thermal energy.
@@samega7cattac Kelvin is yes. Well all of them are linear. I’m just saying that your issues with F equally apply to C. Unless you are saying that 100C is double that of 50C in thermal energy. We could equally create a “Felvin” scale where 0 is set to absolute zero but each increment is set to increase as much as 1F.
@@JonGretarB for that u need a stable base like K where u use other units of the same system to define ur new unit like K depends on J and a constant.
If u wanted to do the same with F, it needs to be defined physically constant. Rn it's not possible with F and wasn't possible with the original C, only after C had been redefined by having K as base, C was linear.
@@samega7cattac F is defined physically constant. It’s tied to kelvin with each degree being 5/9th of C and 0 set to 459.67 °F above absolute zero.
Btw I checked and that scale I talked about of course exists. Called Rankine scale.