Dr. Gabb appears to be mad, quite mad. I switched to decimal coinage long before he did, by virtue of having emigrated to Canada in 1957. When Britain finally decimalized, I regarded it as a good thing, as did most (if not all) rational people. In the computer field, COBOL (COmmon Business-Oriented Language) and other compilers no longer needed their sterling currency feature. Those who used lower-level computer languages (e.g., System/360 Assembler) no longer had to grapple with the inherent arithmetical exceptions and manipulations. Bill Potts, CMS Roseville, CA http://metric1.org [SI Navigator] > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On > Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: April 18, 2001 08:51 > To: U.S. Metric Association > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: [USMA:12292] Ravings and rantings from Sean Gabb > > > > This is a rant by a certain Sean Gabb, who also posted on Dejanews. > This is the site from which this has been copied: > > http://www.btinternet.com/~old.whig/flcomm/flc006.htm > > Han > > Free Life Commentary, an independent journal of comment published on the > Internet > > Editor: Sean Gabb > Issue Number 6 > 10th December 1997 > > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > -------------- > "Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign" > (J.S. Mill, On Liberty, 1859) > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > -------------- > > > Another Rant Against the Metric System > by Sean Gabb > > One morning in March 1967, I turned up at junior school with my > 9d dinner money > and had the first great political shock of my life. I now suppose > that some > Minister in the Wilson Government had just announced The Day: at > the time, I > was taken by surprise when my teacher explained to the class that > in future > there would be no more of these big ugly coins that made our > little hands taste > so funny. Instead, there would be 100 pennies to the pound, and > all the coins > would be new and small, and there would be no more arithmetic > questions that > involved dividing 14/-7d into half a crown. Later that morning, > she introduced > us to the metre and the kilogramme. As I recall, she was insistently > enthusiastic about the simplicity of the new system that we were > soon to have. > > I spent the whole day wanting to cry. I kept pulling out all the > change in > pocket and looking at the coins. I had pennies from the reign of Queen > Victoria - one of them nearly a hundred years old, showing the > Queen as she had > looked in her younger days - and a sixpence that described George > VI as Indiae > Imperator. I had no words then to describe how I felt. But > looking at those > coins that were temporarily mine gave me a firm sense of being > English. They > were one with the oath I swore to the Queen every Tuesday evening at Cub > Scouts, and with the stories of my relatives who had died in the > War, and with > the history books I was beginning voraciously to devour. They > were perhaps more > than that. They were things I could touch. I could imagine the > clothes worn by > the people who so long before had also touched those coins, and > the thoughts in > their heads as they had spent them. They placed me within a > living tradition > that reached back into the mists of time, to King Offa who had > first minted > pennies a thousand years before - a tradition that I wanted to continue a > thousand years after I was dead. As said, I had no words then to > express the > horror that I felt at the coming violation. But those are the > words I would > have used. > > Though I had several years - at the time, it seemed an age - to > prepare myself > for the change, I still hated "Decimal Day" as I had hated > nothing else. Never > once did I believe the claims that this would be an improvement. > I despised the > new coins, with their crude symbolism. I mourned the passing of a > coinage that > combined elegance with solidity, and that gave everyone a history > lesson in his > loose change. I saved all the old coins that came to me before they were > withdrawn; and I still occasionally take them from the jar where > I keep them, > and brood about the collapse of civilisation. > > I have seldom wanted to cry since then, but I have loathed every > other advance > of metrication. Since the present big push began about a decade > ago, I have > looked on helpless as one ancient measurement after another has > been replaced > by the new ones. I now live in a country where it is a criminal > offence to sell > petrol by the gallon and wrapped cheese by the pound, where road > signs are > appearing to say how many metres I can drive before the road > narrows to one > lane, and how many tonnes a bridge can support. > > The latest imposition - and the excuse for this article - is the > change in the > width restrictors on the roads in my part of London. To be correct, the > restrictors have not changed, but their measurement has. The > signs always used > to warn me that vehicles more than 7 foot wide had better go no > further. They > now refer to vehicles over 2.13 metres. > > There are people who wonder at my prejudice against the metric > system. I cannot > deny its utility as a system of measurement. I am even moved by > the harmony of > its parts, so lacking in our own. Nor have I found the least > inconvenience in > adapting to its use in my visits abroad. I lived nearly two years in > Czechoslovakia, and drive every summer to spend time with my > wife's family in > the Slovak Republic. Never once have I been confused by the > metric weights and > measures. Even so, my prejudice against it in my own country is > insuperable, > and it can be justified on two very strong grounds. > > First, for all its logical confusion, the imperial system is part of our > national identity. It evolved during a thousand years of English > history. When > I read a book written in - say - the eighteenth century, I find > myself in a > world very different from my own. For all this, it is a world > with which my own > is plainly continuous. Anyone who needs a footnote or a glossary > to know the > meaning of two shillings or seven inches has been deprived of > part of that > continuity. A further barrier has been erected to that easy > communion with past > ages that has been known and valued in every great nation. To be > cut adrift > from the past is always a bad thing. And to be cut adrift from > the English past > is particularly bad. Metrication is not quite so impassable a barrier as > reformed spelling or changed place names have been elsewhere. But it is a > barrier that will greatly advance the present decline of limited > government and > the rule of law. > > Certainly, shillings and inches are logically separable from > Habeas Corpus and > freedom of the press. But in practice, I do not think they are. For every > person who can put an abstract case for liberty, there are eleven > who regard it > as an inheritance from the past. Bring a sudden end to any part > of that past, > and the other parts will insensibly become less secure. Already, > few Englishmen > have any historical awareness that goes beyond 1940. I was shocked at the > public indifference that attended the third centenary of the Glorious > Revolution and the fourth of the Spanish Armada. Last year, I > gave some home > lessons in English and arithmetic to a couple of schoolboys who had never > learned the order of the Tudor Monarchs or the causes of the English > Reformation. Metrication can only do more to make the past into a foreign > country, inaccessible to any traveller without a mass of > explanations of which > my own generation had no need. > > Second, metrication is unnecessary for any valuable purpose. I > accept the need > for progress. Much of it, I welcome. The conquest of smallpox and > typhus - the > fact that few of us now experience the loss of close relatives > until middle > age - these are blessings. I am writing this article on a > personal computer and > releasing onto the Internet - these also are immense improvements > that already > are liberating millions from the lies of our controlled media. At > the same > time, of course, they are barriers to that easy communion with > the past that I > so value. But they are barriers that are justified by positive > benefits. There > are no such benefits to be had from metrication. > > Leaving aside the madness of getting into them, did we suffer in > the two world > wars because our weapons were calibrated in inches? Did the > Americans fall > behind the Russians in the space race because they measured their > rocket fuel > in gallons? What disaster has attended the computer industry > because of the > three and a half inch floppy disk? > > For the past few centuries, the English-speaking world has had a > reasonably > free economy. In a free economy, improvements are adopted because > they reduce > costs or increase sales. Since the 1870s, it has been legal in > Britain and the > United States to use the metric system for private transactions. > At no time has > there been any spontaneous move towards its general use. In every case, > metrication has been imposed by authority. Even in France, it was > only fully > established in the 1830s - 40 years after the revolutionaries had > commissioned > its development - when the Government compelled its use for all > purposes. In my > own country, unless prohibited by law, the old weights and > measures continue in > use. There is no requirement to sell unwrapped cheese by the > gramme: it is > still sold by the ounce. Regulated pharmacists are forced by law > to dispense > aspirin by the milligramme. My students assure me that free > market pharmacists > continue to dispense cannabis by the eighth and quarter ounce. > > The fact is that most of us still think in the old measurements, > and would > derive solid benefits if we were left alone to use them in our > daily lives. > Certainly, since the change from 7 foot to 2.13 metres in the > restrictors that > limit access to Blackheath Village, I have seen two vans wedged > where none had > ever stuck before. > > As for the greater simplicity of calculating in the metric system, this > advantage - such as it is - has been made wholly unnecessary by > the development > of electronic calculators and computers. I keep my accounts using > a program > called Quicken. It would work just as accurately in pounds, > shillings and pence > as it does in pounds and pence. > > The metric system, then, is not something that makes life easier > for us. It is > instead an imposition by rulers who love nothing more than stamping their > rationalistic prejudices on everyone else. It appeals to their > sense of order. > If it ever becomes feasible, they will probably commission studies into > revising the Earth's orbit to something more decimal than 365 > days, 5 hours, 49 > minutes and five seconds. They certainly regard the old > measurements as yet > another local peculiarity to be smoothed away by their project of global > harmonisation. They really do look forward to the day when each > person in the > world is indistinguishable from every other. They have nearly > finished with the > weights and measures. They have made progress with laws and other > regulations. > Sooner or later, they will proceed to language. That their chosen > language will > be mine gives me no comfort whatever. Better that every county in > England had > its own impenetrable dialect than that all humanity should > worship its masters > in the same clipped, homogenised English. > > Time and inflation have made it impracticable to suggest a return > to the old > currency in England. But the battle over other measurements has > not been lost. > We cannot all take up guns and drill to defend ourselves against > the New World > Order. We cannot all be outspoken against it. But a boycott of the metric > system is also resistance. So long as there are still people to demand > translations "into English" at the cheese counters and in fabric > shops, the > enemy has not triumphed. There will remain one corner of the > public mind that > is forever England. > > My readers may laugh - but all this is just another part of my (probably > futile) stand in defence of freedom. > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > -------------- > > If you like Free Life Commentary, you may also care to subscribe > to my longer, > hard copy journal: > Free Life > The Libertarian Alliance > 25 Chapter Chambers > London SW1P 4NN > > A £12 Pound subscription buys you 12 issues. > > Legal Notice: Though using the name Free Life, this journal is > owned by Sean > Gabb and not by the Libertarian Alliance, which in consequence bears no > liability of whatever kind for the contents. > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > -------------- > Return to Free Life Commentary Index Page > Return to Home Page > Send e-mail to Sean Gabb > Interested in Sponsoring this Page? > Subscribe to Free Life Commentary > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > -------------- > Text updated on the 28th March 2000 by Sean Gabb. > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > -------------- > All data contained here, unless otherwise stated or implied, is © > Sean Gabb > 1988-2000. Permission to republish in hard copy will nearly > always be given, > but I do expect to be asked first. > > > > >
