this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2023
2886 points (97.0% liked)
Strange Planet by Nathan W. Pyle
8634 readers
1 users here now
A community dedicated to Strange Planet comics by Nathan W. Pyle.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Very few countries use both systems.
True but the ones that do are Western English speaking countries like the UK, Ireland (where I am and which is in the final throws of ditching Imperial), Canada and to a lesser extent the US, which uses metric where appropriate.
Those countries are going to be disproportionately represented on here.
I read an article many years ago on why the the US hadn't gone metric and cost is a huge factor. Just replacing all the speed signs across such a huge land mass would be serious money for example with limited benefit.
Folks deal with the change itself just fine. I've lived though the change to metric and my parents lived through the change to decimal currency from shillings etc just fine also so ultimately the US still uses Imperial because it works just fine and the hassle of changing isn't worth it.
Only going to cost more down the line, sunk cost fallacy, etc...
Not really, they can use them until they need to be replaced and then have the replacements have both.
You'd have to have them in different cookies like Texas does with those bullshit fucking day/night speed limits
True. The U.S. is one of them.
In reality, while most countries don't use metric and imperial, they do use metric and some other local system of measurements. Many countries use both metric and their historically preferred system.
.
What non-metric system does Germany use? What non-metric system does France use? What non-metric system does Poland use?
Have you like... Read the articles you posted? I think you might have to re-read what a non-metric unit if measurement would be. All the "units" listed as "still in use in Germany" are based on the metric system. Just because one calls 500g/0.5kg a pound doesn't make the unit non-metric, it's base is metric, same goes for all the other units there. The only non metric unit I see ever is inch because that's what displays are marketed in for you lot and we get the same displays here as you.
This is completely incorrect. SI units exist and they're pretty much based on metric units. It's still a separate unit system.
Wait..
What?! The SI system IS a metric system and doesn't really differ from the systems used in most countries in day to day life. Perhaps by using Kelvin instead of Celsius which is basically the same unit of measurement but with different starting points.
Yeah the metric system is built on top (and a part of) of the SI system, not the other way around.