2001-04-24
Oxford is a British Dictionary. The Oxford dictionary is the standard
dictionary used in Canada. Webster is an American dictionary. I don't
doubt that the slug would appear in an American publication.
John
Keiner ist hoffnungsloser versklavt als derjenige, der irrtümlich glaubt
frei zu sein.
There are none more hopelessly enslaved then those who falsely believe they
are free!
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
----- Original Message -----
From: "Carter, Baron" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Tuesday, 2001-04-24 16:14
Subject: [USMA:12426] Re: NASA and weight vs. mass
> Webster's has it online:
>
> http://www.webster.com/home.htm
>
> Baron Carter
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Tuesday, 24 April, 2001 14:26
> To: U.S. Metric Association
> Subject: [USMA:12423] Re: NASA and weight vs. mass
>
>
> Karl G. Ruling wrote in USMA 12422:
>
> >You're right, of course. I suspect that NASA used weight rather than mass
> >when writing in FFU about the mechanical arm in space because the unit of
> >mass in the foot-pound system is the slug.
>
>
> Wrong. The pound is defined in legislation as the unit of mass.
Engineers
> have habitually used it as a unit of weight, and when that got the
> aeronautical engineers into trouble, they invented the slug which has no
> legal sanction behind it. The slug as a unit of mass does not appear in
> the 1970 edition of the Shorter Oxford Dictionary of the English Language,
>
> Physicists, with a better understanding of Newton, retained the pound as a
> unit of mass, and invented the poundal as the corresponding unit of force.
> The Oxford dictioary dates the poundal from 1879.
>
> Joseph B. Reid
> 17 Glebe Road West
> Toronto M5P 1C8 Tel. 416 486-6071
>
