Metric system of measurements

jtg452 wrote:

Silverwall wrote:
This actually highlights one of the issues, you need a STRONG central govt that will mandate and enforce this change with fines and other punishments for non-compliance. This lack of follow through is what doomed metric in the states.

And then, we could be just as screwed up as Europe and the rest of the world!

Nothing guarantees that a program is going to end as a rolling cluster grope like lots and lots of government involvement and bureaucracy.

Not that we aren't screwed up- it's just in different ways.

What someone considers to be screwed up is mostly subjective in this context. Regardless, a coherent and logical measurement-system makes everything more efficient and cheaper and that a country "fails" to convert to the metric system is one indication on how screwed up some things are.

It’s one ten millionth the distance from the equator to the North Pole!

Well, the meter was originally defined as one ten millionth the distance from EARTH'S equator to the North Pole, on the meridian passing through Paris. So I call it the French System.
Which is kind of inconvenient to calibrate against, so for a long while it was the distance between two marks on a bar of platinum in a vault in France.
Then a whole lot of wavelengths of the light emitted by a particular isotope making a particular transition.
Now officially the distance traveled in 1/299 792 458 second; 1/C.

None of which has any ready reference on Safehold, outside Merlin's cavern.

Thomas Jefferson came up with an entirely different decimal system of weights and measures, which did not get adopted, unlike his decimal currency.
So something similar could be done on Safehold for convenience in calculation, but it wouldn't be the Old Earth metric system unless arbitrarily crammed down their throat by Merlin.

JimWatson wrote:

It’s one ten millionth the distance from the equator to the North Pole!

Well, the meter was originally defined as one ten millionth the distance from EARTH'S equator to the North Pole, on the meridian passing through Paris. So I call it the French System.
Which is kind of inconvenient to calibrate against, so for a long while it was the distance between two marks on a bar of platinum in a vault in France.
Then a whole lot of wavelengths of the light emitted by a particular isotope making a particular transition.
Now officially the distance traveled in 1/299 792 458 second; 1/C.

None of which has any ready reference on Safehold, outside Merlin's cavern.

Thomas Jefferson came up with an entirely different decimal system of weights and measures, which did not get adopted, unlike his decimal currency.
So something similar could be done on Safehold for convenience in calculation, but it wouldn't be the Old Earth metric system unless arbitrarily crammed down their throat by Merlin.

Considering how things have happened so far, if Charis started implementing the metric system a lot of others would soon follow suit. We saw what happened when they introduced the decimal system, although the benefits of it was so great everybody jumped on it. They then introduced the standard weights and measures, it wouldn't be particularly hard for them to introduce the metric variant of those.

I grew up in Texas and Mexico. I learned how to use both systems equally well. In Science i found that the Metric was so easy to use for calculations because it was based off the weight of a cubic mm of H2O. But a Pint a Pound was also off the same idea. The Safehold metric system needs to be like the earthly metric system in that you divide the distance from the pole tot he equator by 1 million. then take that unit and divide by 1000. Call it the new meter, millimeter... etc. use OWL to make the conversions on all the earth science that we use so much and move forward with it.
That would make it easy for safeholders to see the logic in the new math. Otherwise stay with what everyone is already using and wait for all to want to go to space and have electricity, With computers working things out for people slowly transition to earth metric system and return to the stars.

Until electricity is around it doesn't really mater what they use as long as there is a gold standard for everyone to use. It would have been best to introduce the metric system in book 2 and have all of Charis new products in cm, ml etc. and after the war say it was the new math that kicked your butt, then the rest of the world would want it too. Now it is a bit to late for it. something new needs to come out to force the need for the change.

Not really.
Government needed to set the standard initially, but after that it just went ahead. No big bureaucracy or any real government involvement. We do have a bureau of weights and measures, but they just random check retailers to ensure there are no short weights.

jtg452 wrote:

Silverwall wrote:
This actually highlights one of the issues, you need a STRONG central govt that will mandate and enforce this change with fines and other punishments for non-compliance. This lack of follow through is what doomed metric in the states.

And then, we could be just as screwed up as Europe and the rest of the world!

Nothing guarantees that a program is going to end as a rolling cluster grope like lots and lots of government involvement and bureaucracy.

Not that we aren't screwed up- it's just in different ways.

The issue Safehold had pre-Merlin was that the Writ managed to discourage uniform measurements without coming out and saying why. Everyone might have been using the same terminology, but the size of the inch or ounce depended on who you were buying from. Langhorne and Company could have screwed up the metric system the same way if they'd wanted to.

With the imposition of uniform Imperial measurements, Charis is already capable of precision workmanship, and the "Charis inch" is spreading with the spread of industrialization. There's no need at this point to convert to a new system of measurement, in fact that would probably confuse matters and lead to a (temporary) loss of precision as people try to get a feel for the new measurements.

Joat42 wrote:What someone considers to be screwed up is mostly subjective in this context. Regardless, a coherent and logical measurement-system makes everything more efficient and cheaper and that a country "fails" to convert to the metric system is one indication on how screwed up some things are.

Actually, the 'screwed up' comment wasn't about systems of measure.

Instead it was aimed at Silverwall's suggestion that a STRONG (emphasis is his) centralized government capable of forcing such a fundamental change upon the populace was required.

jtg452 wrote:

Joat42 wrote:What someone considers to be screwed up is mostly subjective in this context. Regardless, a coherent and logical measurement-system makes everything more efficient and cheaper and that a country "fails" to convert to the metric system is one indication on how screwed up some things are.

Actually, the 'screwed up' comment wasn't about systems of measure.

Instead it was aimed at Silverwall's suggestion that a STRONG (emphasis is his) centralized government capable of forcing such a fundamental change upon the populace was required.

IIRC, the pharmaceutical industry in the USA converted to metric in the 1950s. This had no effect on the population since they didn't care if a pill had x grains of the active ingredient or y milligrams. They just used the pill. When it came to measures that they actually used (esp, length, volume, and weight/mass), then they noticed. And in the 1970s, they rejected.

Robert_A_Woodward wrote:When it came to measures that they actually used (esp, length, volume, and weight/mass), then they noticed. And in the 1970s, they rejected.

Yup. Like I said in the first post, the only metric measurement that survived that failed experiment in daily life in the US is the 2 liter soft drink bottle.

In daily life, we do a rough conversion and guesstimate in our heads or just ignore the metric babblings if we can.

Our foreign friend thinks that we need a STRONG (his emphasis, not mine) central government to shove such a change down our collective throats- so we can be made to conform- in more ways than merely using a different system of measure.

jtg452 wrote:In daily life, we do a rough conversion and guesstimate in our heads or just ignore the metric babblings if we can.

Which is the point, in daily life you usually get away with rough conversions and guesstimates, not so much when it comes actual engineering and science where exactness is often the thing that decides if something works or not. There's a reason why historically when doing precision-engineering in imperial, you tried to stick to just one type of unit throughout, since conversion between some units introduced precision-losses.

Adherence to the mantra of "this is what I was taught, I can't be bothered to learn something else" is a sign of stagnation or just plain stubbornness in the face of progress.