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As an American, why is America different when it is stupid to be different?
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all of this is pretty much nonsense. anyone who uses the metric system has a good "about" understanding that is just as if not more accurate as your about the size of a foot/thumb example.
there is no logical reason "feet" as a unit is better for aviation.
which is completely arbitrary and turns out isn't all that practical when you need to think about cooking or any other kind of situation where the range is different.
Using celsius you have just as good a practical/intuitive understanding with the benefit that it has a solid scientific definition, uses the same unit as kelvin and can easily be compared and used with any kind of temperature range.
there is literally not a single logical argument for fahrenheit being better.
Ah right. That's what I meant.
Ninja Of Chaos
Member
Efficiency and consistency are for nerds. Every country should use different measuring systems. That'd be fun.
Most of the American measurement standards were also British standards up until about 30 years ago. We still have a kind of hybrid system here. At school you learn the metric system but in daily life most people still uses stones and pounds (14 pounds in a stone) to describe their weight, feet and inches to describe their height, miles to describe traveling distance, mph to describe speed, etc. Measurements of food and liquid are all metric and science/engineering is all metric. Some people still talk in Fahrenheit although most use Celsius. I would imagine this kind of transition, which is still not complete in the UK, is more complicated in a country like the US with such a large population and different levels of state/federal legislature.
SomedayTheFire
Member
I mean isn't using an actual thumb and foot to measure things really fucking dumb? Considering not everyone has the same sized appendages?
I don't know about you but 0 Celsius generally signifies, water freezes at that point therefore it's going to be icy and possibly snowy. Which, to me makes more sense than an arbitrary "really cold day", which by the way isn't what Fahrenheit was originally based on.
I say it's the 14th of June.
PdotMichael
Banned
Back in the good old days every town had a different measuring system.
CouchMaster
Member
Base 12 system (used for time) is superior to decimal system simply because you have more factors, so more calculations will return whole numbers instead of fractions. So it should've been other way round but it isn't, probably because people have only 10 fingers.
Read through the thread and it's basically this pic.Liked this pic I saw a while back:
Pro-arguments for metric system:
- the measurements make sense because how they relate to each other
- the whole world uses it, including millions of scientists, which should be sign for efficiency
Contra-arguments:
- America went to the moon
- American's are used to it, so it's practical for their everyday life
I hope this "problem" will solve itself in a few decades one way or the other.
CaptainGyro
Banned
Our scientists use it here too.
It's not like we are totally oblivious to the metric system and don't ever use it, For example I just went to the doctor and my summary has both imperial and metric numbers on it for weight, height, temp etc. As I also mentioned our food packaging has both imperial and metric numbers. Cars have Miles per hour and kph on the speedometer. we just don't use it for shit like about using it to describe how how fat we are or how far a location is or what the temperature is outside or whatever. Does it really matter? Yeah yeah Mars Orbiter, one freak accident because some guy was a dumbass
Not fully adopting the metric system is monumentally dumb. It's far easier and more logical.
We also don't use it for construction. Go to Home Depot and everything is imperial from lumber to tools. So dumb. But we do use it for cars because it was adopted by the SAE. You often have to buy redundant sets of tools or if you try to get it "close enough" you can end up rounding off the corners of nuts and bolts, etc.
We also don't use it for construction. Go to Home Depot and everything is imperial from lumber to tools. So dumb. But we do use it for cars because it was adopted by the SAE. You often have to buy redundant sets of tools or if you try to get it "close enough" you can end up rounding off the corners of nuts and bolts, etc.
NoblesseOblige
Banned
Nope, you were the first. My comment was mostly tongue-in-cheek. I personally don't care what standard others use because I'm lingual in prevalent measurement systems and have no issue going between them. I agree that yyyy/mm/dd is better for archiving, however most digital documents carry the date added and modified information with them, which can be sorted by y/m/d regardless of how the date is presented in the name of the document.
Alx
Member
The way you use AM/PM, that was discussed in the E3 thread recently. It's fine to specify morning/afternoon when speaking of hours (most other languages do it too in colloquial speaking), but how can the following sequence make sense :
...,10 AM, 11 AM, 12 PM, 1PM, 2PM, ..., 11PM, 12 AM, 1AM, 2AM,...
instead of
...,10 AM, 11 AM, 12 AM, 1PM, 2PM, ..., 11PM, 12 PM = 0 AM, 1AM, 2AM,...
NobleGundam
Banned
I read these comments in Tony Stark's voice.
Glorious.
Blew my mind on my first visit to America two weeks ago that all the beer cans/ bottles were in fluid ounces. I was thrown and had to find the small print on the cans to see the mL so I knew if it was a good price.
But I really liked the 750 mL fosters cans of beer. Fuck me they were awesome. Wish they sold them back in the UK
But I really liked the 750 mL fosters cans of beer. Fuck me they were awesome. Wish they sold them back in the UK
I'm pretty sure the UK does it the same way...
As in you go 10am, 11am, 12pm.
It makes sense if you think about it at midnight:
Say it's 11:30 pm on the 14th of June, an hour later it would be 12:30am on the 15th of June.
If you used it the other way around then you'd be saying it's 12:30pm of the next day which makes no sense...
That said the 24 hours system is superior.
DonasaurusRex
Online Ho Champ
may our date format never change....
My bad
Well, if they're essentially all the same, it can't be hard to answer my question how many gallons are there in a cubic foot?
Because, as I said, for metric the equivalent question is really easy to answer.
Yeah the AM/PM is more of an English language thing rather than an American one. Australia/NZ also use AM/PM.
And yeah the 24 hour system is better for writing things down. 12 hour system is all right for when you're talking to people though.
Why?
Yeah, in standard conversation the 12 hour system is okay because it's easier to interpret based on context.
I'm still waiting for a reason why. The obvious upside of Celsius is the freezing point of water at 0, because that's quite important for weather purposes.
Whereas yeah, Fahrenheit is more "precise", but you don't need that in real life. The difference between 24°C and 25°C isn't really big.
Also, Celsius is far more useful for cooking and other stuff, and having two temperature scales would be even more madness.
DonasaurusRex
Online Ho Champ
color or colour?
Alx
Member
Nah it would be 0:30 AM. Of course people wouldn't commonly say "zero-thirty" but "midnigh-thirty".
Anyway if it's about making sense, I think it's easier to consider that 12 AM comes after 11 AM. The best thing is that it even makes it consistent with the 24 hours system. Just consider that AM is the same as the 24 hours system, and PM is just substracting 12 to use noon as a reference instead of midnight.
CaptainGyro
Banned
Ok fine I'll give you that is stupid not to change. I don't know why they can't use metric, since as I've said before it's not like we don't have anything here at all that shows metric measurements
davepoobond
you can't put a price on sparks
Because we don't live in the ocean, we live in air
SpacePirate Ridley
Member
And your reason will be, becuase we are accostumed to say 100 is hot. Or because this random numbers tell me what clothes I have to wear.
But then you want to boil water to cook, and makes 0 sense.
And the funny thing, the rest of the world will tell you they are accostumed to do the same thing, but with a better system.
0 Dont go out or you will freeze, or bring HEAVY winter clothes
10 Get winter clothes
20 spring clothes
30 summer clothes
40 stay at home or somewhere with AC, or go to the pool or beach
And then we can also use it to cook at numbers that make sense and do other everyday chores.
Funny how the word accostumed works...
Well, ocean water doesnt freeze at 0ºC either so...
Fahrenheit is more accurate for the range of temperatures humans experience as it relates to weather. Celsius having convenient numbers for boiling and freezing of water is somewhat irrelevant for air temperature and has a much smaller range of Temps we experience. I'm a scientists and use metric for everything in the lab, but still prefer Fahrenheit for everyday air temperature. Liquid Temps though I prefer Celsius.
So you want more madness with different temperature scales for water and air? What?
Oh, also, freezing temperatures are quite important for our everyday lives I'd say.
Yes, it's more accurate, but you don't actually need it. The difference between 20°C and 21°C is already small, there isn't really a need for a difference between 68°F and 69°F. And if you really, really need it, you can always go in .5°C or even .1°C steps.
Alx
Member
We live in air in constant gaseous state (otherwise we'd die). So we can't use any physical reference related to air to measure temperature, otherwise we would.
Water is the most common element in our environment that we can observe changing state twice. We have to deal with ice and boiling water in our daily life, so using it as a reference makes a lot more sense than anything related to air or brime.
The European way of life is superior to the American
Year Month Day Hour Minute Second
Celsius is simple and practical
Abolished Death Penalty
Guns must be heavily regulated
Never ever tip at restaurants
Roundabouts make traffic run smoother
Toilet paper facing outwards
Pineapple on pizza
Sharp knees are attractive
Anime is not a genre
Atheists are more compassionate
Drive stick
Ice Hockey is better than any outdoor sports
Sustainable energy sources
Year Month Day Hour Minute Second
Celsius is simple and practical
Abolished Death Penalty
Guns must be heavily regulated
Never ever tip at restaurants
Roundabouts make traffic run smoother
Toilet paper facing outwards
Pineapple on pizza
Sharp knees are attractive
Anime is not a genre
Atheists are more compassionate
Drive stick
Ice Hockey is better than any outdoor sports
Sustainable energy sources
The accuracy is pointless though. What's the point in having a range from 0-100 Fahrenheit when almost nobody can tell the difference of 1 Celsius.
Celsius having convenient for freezing water is most definitely relevant to weather (of which air temperature is only an aspect of).
There's also the fact that Celsius is better for cooking etc.
When I heat my home in the winter I can most definitely tell you the difference between 68, 69, and 70F.
Read my example of farmers below...you just want to think everything is nonsense because they do not conform to your own standards.
You absolutely do not know what you are talking about. Majority of the aviation industry uses feet, go do your research please.
I skydive as a hobby and I am infinitely more comfortable using an altimeter with feet scale and so are my pilots.
This is because for a height of 4.5km, the scale can go from 0 to around 14,500 when using feet but if I use an altimeter with meter scale the scale goes from 0 to only 4,500. Don't you see why it makes more sense here? The distance between every 100 units is far higher when you are using meters than when you are using feets...this is why for aviation feets is preferred.
When reading an altimeter a change of 100 meter is just one unit in the dial that reads in meters, you get a little over 3 units when the dial reads in feet.
That's why it's approximate and you don't need accuracy for regular day to day stuff. Can you come up with an approximate for cm and metres using your body parts ? Suppose there's an farmer or just some dude who wants to measure using a non marked tape or rope....how does he gain an approximate sense of the distance in metric? He will be able to get an approximate sense of distance if he just uses his body parts to measure the rope.
My paternal family members are farmers and I see them do this because it's easier for them.
Fahrenheit is not " arbitrary" it has a real scale and it is used for body temperature measurement. Someone explained it in the last page very well over why Fahrenheit works well for body temperature and not Celsius. And because it works well for body temperature it can get applied to the environment temperature in the sense that it's really hot for the body or really cold for the body.
Also why not use Kelvin? it's more scientific and if more scientific is what you want then you should absolutely be using that scaled instead.
Well this is where it comes down to choice, date standards vary everywhere despite what the usual norm for the country might be. I say June 14th but I'll say 21st of Jan for my birthday, it varies and this is not an important thing. The point I was trying to make there was that the OP said it's nonsense....when it isn't. Everything about imperial makes sense it's just that it isn't base 10 mathematics.
Hell I don't even use imperial and I frown upon British practice of mixing both imperial and metric but I won't say " lol dumb americans" or "this is nonsense".
Because defining the freezing point of water as zero makes sense for weather and in everyday life, while the lowest temperature of the universe doesn't.
shanshan310
Member
like that good ol' American holiday you guys must call "July 4" right?
Dude Abides
Banned
Both July Fourth and Fourth of July are acceptable and common. It's called Freedom.
NoblesseOblige
Banned
"Fourth of July" is used almost exclusively in referencing a holiday. But even then most people around here just call the holiday July 4th (or independence day).
Suddenly the crying eagle in front of an American flag makes sense. The eagle is sad that it can't live the European way.
nephilimdj
Member
Americans just cannot handle maths
How is it that you are ok to discount the fact that you do not need scientific accuracy here for the sake of practicality but you do when discussing Fahrenheit ?
Not everyone lives in a place that can have water freezing temperature or a place where water can evaporate in minutes, but we all do have similar body temperatures. Read this over why Fahrenheit can make practical sense too.
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