The author got the conversion from FEET TO MILES wrong! He used 5260. It
is of course 5280. If people like this can't get USC right, with its arcane
conversion factors for everything, then all the more reason to bring on metric!
John F-L
- Original Message -
From: Nat Hager
Cole,
Good to get an update from someone on the ground.
When you hear people talking to each other when they are not speaking of their
body masses or their height or how much mass they might have gained or lost,
what sort of mix do you hear of Imperial and metric in their everyday
Probably to keep American truck drivers from bashing into the bridges. (The
same reason why the UK puts metric up, for the drivers from the Continent.)
Carleton
- Original Message -
From: Cole Kingsbury cgkings...@comcast.net
To: U.S. Metric Association usma@colostate.edu
Here is the response I got from The Nature of Things regarding the use of
metric on their program.
-- Ezra
- Forwarded Message -
From: Vance Chow vance.c...@cbc.ca
To: ezra steinberg ezra.steinb...@comcast.net
Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 7:54:42 AM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
Thanks Ezra - at least that confirms my initial comment, which was that David Z
always did use metric on The Nature of Things.
John F-L
- Original Message -
From: ezra.steinb...@comcast.net
To: U.S. Metric Association
Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 7:03 PM
Subject:
It's been some time since Ireland switched so it is interesting to hear the
use of imperial for walking (and thus road) distances. I wonder if it's simply
down to 'convenient talking' - ie that 'yard' is single syllable to 'metre's'
two.
Probably. But that's maybe slightly misleading.
Along those lines, Irish cab drivers used meters calibrated in miles until just
a few years ago. And people who grew up thinking of distances to certain
landmarks in miles will likely continue to do so.
Another possibility is that folks in Ireland who find they are speaking to a
Briton
A cent is a hundredth part of a dollar and a centimetre is a hundredth part
of a metre. The British politicians got it wrong (as usual) when they
introduced new pennies (as if nobody would not notice that one new penny
was worth 2.4 old pennies).
_
From: owner-u...@colostate.edu
Your first point is very valid. It's also possible that those distances will
pass from father to son, mother to daughter etc. Another VERY important thing
(imho) is that Ireland have not done the draconian things that S.A and
Australia did - and that is to ban items such as measuring devices
This time we rented a car for the weekend because (get this) it was
cheaper to rent a car and drive it to Dublin from the airport and leave
it for the weekend then drive it back than the cost of a taxi to do the
same!
The taxi fares from the airport are long known as a complete rip-off -
You're correct Martin (although I guess they had to distinguish between the
different pennies for a while) however my point was that like feet and inches
have a different unit name depending on scale - so does money. That's why
money was 'decimalised' rather than 'metricated' - ie the rules
This time we rented a car for the weekend because (get this) it was
cheaper to rent a car and drive it to Dublin from the airport and leave
it for the weekend then drive it back than the cost of a taxi to do the
same!
The taxi fares from the airport are long known as a complete
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