Last night I woke up three times and I remember the dreams I was having right before I woke up each time. The first was related to something I was thinking about right before bed: the metric system. Everyone in science is infatuated with the metric system and glares at America for using the standard system. But what's a meter? Who decided to use that length and why is it more valid than a foot? A foot is based on the rough size of a man's foot. If you're without a tape measure and need to approximate something's length, you could eyeball it and say "Well, it's between one and two meters but that's as close as I can get you." If you used your feet to measure, you could say "It's about four feet." You'd be more accurate than the metric system.
Is converting from one form to the next easier with the metric system? Yes, if you have them memorized. Centi, milli, deka, deci, kilo, nano, micro, etc. Some people do have them all memorized. If I asked the average Brit to convert all of them, I suspect they'd be clueless. So the metric system's ease of conversion isn't all that great. It's not a miracle worker that magically allows anyone to convert it. So what we should do with the Standard system is change inches and yards and whatever else to units of ten. Ten inches in a foot. Ten feet in a yard, or a dekafoot. Something like that.
See, the metric system was supposed to be designed "for all people for all time," except it's arbitrary. There's no reason behind the length of anything except that it is ten of this other arbitrary length. As I've explained, a foot has a reason behind it. It makes sense. The metric system doesn't so I don't like it. I see the problems with standard system that the US has, but I see just as many with the metric. And the trite argument that everyone else uses metric is the biggest piece of shit logic ever. Convention doesn't make something right or wrong. It just makes it agreed upon. It's convention. See the tautology in that? Just because everyone else is wrong, doesn't mean we should be to. Or maybe they're not wrong; they're just different. Doesn't mean we have to be. If they had a valid reason for doing that, one better than ours, then yes I'd say we should convert. But there is none in my ten minutes of research. The closest I can find is "Originally intended to be one ten-millionth of the distance from the Earth's equator to the North Pole (at sea level), its definition has been periodically refined to reflect growing knowledge of metrology. Since 1983, it is defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum in 1⁄299,792,458 of a second.[1]" And that's just wikipedia. How is that any easier to memorize than 12 inches to a foot. A foot is the length of "most" people's foot. Which is really easier? Hmm?
And that's what my dream was about. Then security came and knocked on someone's door. Someone below them had water dripping on them, so security had to come and ask if they had just showered and if they were using the shower curtain properly. Then they went in the room and I couldn't hear the conversation any more. It was about 1:30 when that happened.
Second dream, the study abroad group was on some cliffs. They weren't the Cliffs of Moher or the Aran Islands, but they were cliffs and there was a big grassy field around them, so we were playing tag. Tecwyn encouraged us to. It was a big competition and I made it to the last round and there were alliances formed and Will got hurt and I was trying to both save him and win the game. And we were on a train at some point, but it wasn't a modern train. It looked old-fashiony with weird decorations on the wall. It reminded me of The Twilight Zone episode where the guy got off the train and was in the 1800s.
The third dream, I was an astronaut. The end.
Is converting from one form to the next easier with the metric system? Yes, if you have them memorized. Centi, milli, deka, deci, kilo, nano, micro, etc. Some people do have them all memorized. If I asked the average Brit to convert all of them, I suspect they'd be clueless. So the metric system's ease of conversion isn't all that great. It's not a miracle worker that magically allows anyone to convert it. So what we should do with the Standard system is change inches and yards and whatever else to units of ten. Ten inches in a foot. Ten feet in a yard, or a dekafoot. Something like that.
See, the metric system was supposed to be designed "for all people for all time," except it's arbitrary. There's no reason behind the length of anything except that it is ten of this other arbitrary length. As I've explained, a foot has a reason behind it. It makes sense. The metric system doesn't so I don't like it. I see the problems with standard system that the US has, but I see just as many with the metric. And the trite argument that everyone else uses metric is the biggest piece of shit logic ever. Convention doesn't make something right or wrong. It just makes it agreed upon. It's convention. See the tautology in that? Just because everyone else is wrong, doesn't mean we should be to. Or maybe they're not wrong; they're just different. Doesn't mean we have to be. If they had a valid reason for doing that, one better than ours, then yes I'd say we should convert. But there is none in my ten minutes of research. The closest I can find is "Originally intended to be one ten-millionth of the distance from the Earth's equator to the North Pole (at sea level), its definition has been periodically refined to reflect growing knowledge of metrology. Since 1983, it is defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum in 1⁄299,792,458 of a second.[1]" And that's just wikipedia. How is that any easier to memorize than 12 inches to a foot. A foot is the length of "most" people's foot. Which is really easier? Hmm?
And that's what my dream was about. Then security came and knocked on someone's door. Someone below them had water dripping on them, so security had to come and ask if they had just showered and if they were using the shower curtain properly. Then they went in the room and I couldn't hear the conversation any more. It was about 1:30 when that happened.
Second dream, the study abroad group was on some cliffs. They weren't the Cliffs of Moher or the Aran Islands, but they were cliffs and there was a big grassy field around them, so we were playing tag. Tecwyn encouraged us to. It was a big competition and I made it to the last round and there were alliances formed and Will got hurt and I was trying to both save him and win the game. And we were on a train at some point, but it wasn't a modern train. It looked old-fashiony with weird decorations on the wall. It reminded me of The Twilight Zone episode where the guy got off the train and was in the 1800s.
The third dream, I was an astronaut. The end.
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