Subject:
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Re: the metric system
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 1 May 2001 15:01:29 GMT
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Viewed:
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268 times
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....
> Anyways, I'm in complete agreement with the "yea" argument.
> But as someone else has mentioned, the conversion is now
> immobile, fixed at (in the example given) 1"=2.54cm (approx).
> ...
I recently had to do somethin involving metirc conversion and was told that at
some point the inch was redefind by the international standards people to be
exactly 2.54 cm.
>
> The last time, IIRC, that the meter changed definitively
> was 1873. I think it got its current measure--based on the
> speed of light, which had, ironically, originally been determined
> by the standard bar in Paris--came into being recently, but the
> goal is still that standard manufactured in 1873 under 'ideal'
....
I thought that the meter was defined in terms of the wavelenght of Krypton (the
gas not the planet) as measured by a laser under specific controlled
conditions. This definition must have been introduced after the invention of
the laser in the fifties.
Just to keep the holy wars going, the big deal about the metiric system is
everything is based on 10. The yard is based on 36. One observation (let the
flames be lit) is that 36 has a whole bunch more integer divisors that 10. You
can have 1/2 1/3 1/4 or 1/6 1/9 or 1/12 of a yard in whole sub-units. Also
sub-units of an inch are binary, (1/2 , 1/4, 1/8 etc) which is easy to mark
when you are cutting something (woodworking reference). It can be awkward to
make a 1/4 (or worse 1/3 scale) example of something give in metric.
He who is about to be flamed salutes you
Lester
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: the metric system
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| (...) Really? Cool! Maybe the Euro will be NGL 2.20 one day, and not NGL 2.203. ;) I know, immaterial, given that the Guilder shall cease to exist on 1 March 2002. (...) n.b.: 1872 was the actual Conference that made one particular meter bar the (...) (23 years ago, 1-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: the metric system
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| (...) You know, I was going to comment on that, then I saw that you already had. (The part about Tim championing science, that is.) I almost fell out of my chair when I read that! :) I was half prepared to read "cubits." Or are we just being evil, (...) (23 years ago, 1-May-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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