Dear All,
I have just submitted the following to the BBC car evaluation program,
'Top Gear':
Dear Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May,
I have watched your 'Top Gear' program on several occasions and I have
enjoyed your style of presentation and your program's content.
My problem with watching your program is that you stress old pre-
metric measuring words as though these had some relevance in the motor
industry. I live in Geelong – a Ford manufacturing town – where we
were aware of the 'world car concept' based on the metric system from
the early 1970s. We knew then, that in the motor industry, the
metrication process was both inevitable and irreversible and this has
subsequently proved to be the truth.
I have no doubt that you have also seen the inevitability and the
irreversibility of metric measuring in the motor vehicle industry in
all car, truck, and bike manufacturing industries, yet your team seems
to disregard metric measuring units like watts and kilowatts as if
they don't exist.
In the Australian motor manufacturing industry most engineers simply
accepted the simplicity and ease-of-use provided by metric units and
then got on with improving the excellence of their engineering skills.
Some whinged and whined and I suspect that these might be the people
who are influencing your choices such as whether you use horsepowers
or kilowatts.
As I watch your program I simply don't know whether you have a quite
deliberate policy to lead the British people toward the ancient past
of the Roman invasion of England (with their inches and ounces), and
the French invasion of 1066 (with their avoirdupois pounds, quarters,
hundredweights, and tons), or whether you are acting innocently simply
kowtowing to whingers and whiners in the BBC audience who operate on
the principle that 'it's the squeaky wheel that gets the oil'.
I suspect (and hope) that it is the latter However, I have to say that
I find it extremely sad to watch you promote untruths and obfuscation
to the people of the UK – whether deliberate or not.
Some of the whingers and whiners you support possibly believe that
they are avoiding the foreign metric system as a point of national UK
pride. This is a totally erroneous view as the metric system was
invented in England and first published in London in 1668 by Bishop
John Wilkins (see http://www.metricationmatters.com/who-invented-the-metric-system.html
).
The French did not develop the decimal metric system from Bishop John
Wilkins plan until more than 120 years later in the 1790s. You also
know that many of the words appropriate to cars and their engines are
quintessentially English words – the James Watt inspired watts and
kilowatts are obvious examples.
Another concern that I have is that I think by your choice of old pre-
metric foreign words, such as inch, ounce, and pound, you are actively
sabotaging the education of children in the UK. I know that sabotage
is a strong word so let me explain.
Children in the UK, especially children who might be interested in
cars, motors, and mechanical engineering have to learn the metric
system to understand cars and motors; then they have to find out about
all of the old pre-metric words to understand your comments on 'Top
Gear'. In my considered opinion, this is a pure and simple sabotage of
these children's education as they feel they have to learn multiple
measuring words simply to understand you and your comments.
I know of only one study of this from the USA, where Richard Phelps
estimates that it takes USA children an extra year to learn the
mathematics of inches and ounces when compared to (say) Singapore
children who only need to learn the metric system; the USA has to
spend an extra 10 % of its mathematics education budget just to be
something like 37th out of 38 OECD nations in comparative mathematics
tests. You are encouraging this same differentiation in the UK by your
choice of measuring words – and I don't believe that this is at all
fair to British children. You can view Richard P. Phelps' article
after you register on the Education Weekly database at: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/1992/12/09/14phelps.h12.html
As a side issue, you are also perpetrating and continuing the totally
unnecessary, and seemingly endless, discussion about the metrication
of the UK as a whole. This is extremely expensive for the whole of the
UK as a nation, as it is for all nations who resist the simplicity,
honesty, openness, and worldwide application of the metric system. I
have not specifically investigated this cost in the UK but you may be
able to draw some parallels from this estimate I made for the USA
after visiting there a year or two ago: http://www.metricationmatters.com/docs/CostOfNonMetrication.pdf
Yours faithfully,
Pat Naughtin
Geelong, Australia
Cheers,
Pat Naughtin
Author of the ebook, Metrication Leaders Guide, that you can obtain
from http://metricationmatters.com/MetricationLeadersGuideInfo.html
PO Box 305 Belmont 3216,
Geelong, Australia
Phone: 61 3 5241 2008
Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has
helped thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the
modern metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they
now save thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for
their businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many
different trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial
and government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA.
Pat's clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST,
and the metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA. See http://www.metricationmatters.com
for more metrication information, contact Pat at pat.naugh...@metricationmatters.com
or to get the free 'Metrication matters' newsletter go to: http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter
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