Metric system dumbs us down.

[Macblaze]

And did you all know that the watt is technically metric? I love Wikipedia.

As purists, we should all be wondering how many horsepower our solar panels put out...

[masonc]

Originally Posted by CaptTom

I find the imperial system easier.

That's just ludicrous.

[Jason Flare]

Originally Posted by Macblaze

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendenhall_Order

All y'all are taking this too seriously. Instead of arguing which system is best you should be rebelling and go back to measure your own body parts. According to some sources, the whole standardization of measures and weights was nothing but a ploy on the part of governments to get more taxes. You people are nothing but tools of the establishment helping stuff their bloated pockets with more tax dollars <insert evil laugh>!

I hadn't been concerned with any of this until this thread came up and the proponents of the metric system got a woody because barleycorns are now measured with the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second.

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Macblaze

And did you all know that the watt is technically metric? I love Wikipedia.

If you take "metric" to be a synonym for "International System of Units (SI)" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_system )
then "technically" is superfluous. The Watt is by definition a metric unit.

[/QUOTE]
As purists, we should all be wondering how many horsepower our solar panels put out...[/QUOTE]

According to a few electric propulsion advocates around here, the answer is "at least three times as many as a nominally equivalent diesel engine".

[buzzstar]

Originally Posted by Macblaze

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendenhall_Order

All y'all are taking this too seriously. Instead of arguing which system is best you should be rebelling and go back to measure your own body parts. According to some sources, the whole standardization of measures and weights was nothing but a ploy on the part of governments to get more taxes. You people are nothing but tools of the establishment helping stuff their bloated pockets with more tax dollars <insert evil laugh>!

Only did that in my early teens.

[Benz]

Originally Posted by StuM

Try this:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...le_radians.gif

Radians are usually not labelled, so if you see an angle which is not followed by "°" or "g" or "mils" then you can assume it is in radians.

There are centigrads but since there are 40,000 of them in a circle, there is not much point in trying to divide them further.

How do you divide a circle into degrees with just a ruler? Normally it takes a compass as well.

But if you can do it in one system of units, you can do it the same in another.

Here you go, Stu, as promised. Oh, you also need a pencil--should have said that. Anyhow:
draw a horizontal line through the center. Draw a second line through the center perpendicular to the first. You have now divided the circle into quarters (what's metric for "quarter?"...nevermind). Now measure the chord of the arc between 0 (where the top of the vertical line intersects the circle) and 90 (where the right end of the horizontal line intersects the circle). Make a mark exactly halfway between, then draw a line that intersects both the center and that mark. You have now drawn 45 degrees, and it's reciprocal is 225.
Here's where it gets interesting: Measure half of the chord between 0 and 45; it will be 22 1/2 degrees, which is useless normally but necessary for this step. Now, place your ruler so it measures one inch from the vertical line to the 45 degree line, making sure the 22 1/2 line passes through the half-inch mark. Holding the ruler there, make a mark at 1/8 of the inch. A line crossing that and the middle will put 5 degrees on your circle. Now you can measure the chord of the arc between 0 and 5, mark it between 5 and 10, and so continue around until you reach 180, at which point you'll have 5 degree increments all around your circle.
If you need increments finer than 5 degrees, and cannot visually interpolate, you'll have to do more measuring, but having done that much, it shouldn't be too hard.
Of course, far easier than this would be simply to make sure you always have a good supply of Universal Plotting Sheets on hand, which I'm sure every prudent mariner does.

Best,
Ben
zartmancruising dot com

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Jason Flare

I hadn't been concerned with any of this until this thread came up and the proponents of the metric system got a woody because barleycorns are now measured with the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second.

Just to clarify,in case you need to know: one barleycorn is actually slightly less than the length of the path traveled by light in a vacuum during a time interval of 1/35 269 700 941 of a second.

[buzzstar]

Originally Posted by StuM

If you take "metric" to be a synonym for "International System of Units (SI)" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_system )
then "technically" is superfluous. The Watt is by definition a metric unit.

As purists, we should all be wondering how many horsepower our solar panels put out...[/QUOTE]

According to a few electric propulsion advocates around here, the answer is "at least three times as many as a nominally equivalent diesel engine". [/QUOTE]

After checking the references, at least one, it does appear that the draft horses on the Continent must have been smaller than those in Scotland. by ~10 watts.

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Benz

Here you go, Stu, as promised. Oh, you also need a pencil--should have said that. Anyhow:
draw a horizontal line through the center. Draw a second line through the center perpendicular to the first.

Reminds me of the recipe for rabbit stew which begins with "first catch your rabbit"

How do you determine the perpendicular with just a ruler?

You have now divided the circle into quarters (what's metric for "quarter?"...nevermind). Now measure the chord of the arc between 0 (where the top of the vertical line intersects the circle) and 90 (where the right end of the horizontal line intersects the circle). Make a mark exactly halfway between, then draw a line that intersects both the center and that mark. You have now drawn 45 degrees, and it's reciprocal is 225.
Here's where it gets interesting: Measure half of the chord between 0 and 45; it will be 22 1/2 degrees, which is useless normally but necessary for this step. Now, place your ruler so it measures one inch from the vertical line to the 45 degree line, making sure the 22 1/2 line passes through the half-inch mark. Holding the ruler there, make a mark at 1/8 of the inch.

My ruler is metric, it doesn't have 1/8ths marked

And any line between the 0° and 45° lines will automatically cross a 22.5° line at its mid-point. You don't have to "make sure" of anything. In fact that 22.5° line is totally superfluous at this stage.

A line crossing that and the middle will put 5 degrees on your circle.

That doesn't actually work. You are effectively dividing 45° into 1/8ths, so it's not 5°, it's 5.625°.

Draw any line between the two lines at 45° which measures an exact multiple of eight, mark of 1/8ths of the lengths of that line and draw lines from the centre through those marks will give you the same thing. But as I said, you won't get exactly 5° between any of the lines.

Now you can measure the chord of the arc between 0 and 5, mark it between 5 and 10, and so continue around until you reach 180, at which point you'll have 5 degree increments all around your circle.

If you do that, your chords will not meet the 45° etc line, you will have to keep"fudging it" to allow for that extra 0.625° in each chord.

Ah! now I see why you made that 22.5° line. You can fudge you markings 8 times instead of just 4.

If you need increments finer than 5 degrees, and cannot visually interpolate, you'll have to do more measuring, but having done that much, it shouldn't be too hard.
Of course, far easier than this would be simply to make sure you always have a good supply of Universal Plotting Sheets on hand, which I'm sure every prudent mariner does.

Best,
Ben
zartmancruising dot com

So you are not "dividing a circle into degrees", you are "dividing it into divisions of approximately 5° degrees and fudging the gaps every 45° to make it roughly fit".

I must admit, when you said a "ruler", I was thinking of "a straight edge" as used in geometry (i.e. without having to accurately read numbers on a scale).

[farotherside]

you know, I've ranted about this for years - but here's the rub.

I've long since forgiven Americans for not using metric - it's not your fault, it's just what you were taught. HOWEVER, there's one thing that I believe Americans have done to the metric system that frankly I find unconscionable!

Metric is used in nearly every country in the world (so around 195 countries, give or take), and the units have been translated into almost every spoken language on the planet.

it's a simple system: a prefix declaring the scope, in multiples of ten, of a base unit. kilo for thousands, milli for thousandths, giga for billions. kilograms. millimeters. gigabytes. AND SO FORTH.

but there is one - ONE! - unit of measurement, in one - ONE! - spoken language that bugs the ever-loving **** out of me, and frankly even though it's pervasive to the entire english-speaking world, I'm pretty sure you Americans started it, and spread it via your admittedly amazing movies and television.

that unit is the kilometer.

remember the rules? prefix-unit. KILO is pronounced KILL-oh. METER is pronounced MEE-turr. say it with me: KILL-oh-MEE-turr.

now say it like you almost certainly normally do: kill-AWW-meh-turr.

now try saying ANY OTHER UNIT IN THE METRIC system that way. gig-AWW-bytes. mill-IMM-iturs. kill-AWW-grums.

my anthopologic hypothesis is that during the Korean war, US military intelligence switched to using kilometers as the base unit for maps - "clicks", in grunt terms. when the word 'kilometer' came to light as the root of 'clicks', young US soldiers pronounced the word in the same way they'd pronounce other similar words, like "speedometer", or "tachometer"... I have no proof of this, but it sounds pretty good.

still, IT MAKES NO SENSE, and you're SAYING IT WRONG. the system is *very* clear! prefix-unit! the pronunciation of the prefix on its' own ("kilo") and the unit on its' own ("meter") works for EVERY OTHER UNIT OF MEASUREMENT. mega. byte. kilo. gram.

ONE unit of measurement, in ONE language.

sure, you'll dismiss me - but mark my words: there is a great and secret war occurring right under your noses, and history will determine who wins. pick your side! join me in pronouncing it KILL-oh-meter!

(...and now that you've noticed it, you'll *always* notice it! ahahahahah!)

[barnakiel]

I grew up metric but I find both systems simple. I do not move within the imperial fluently, true, but it is only so because I do not live in it every day. What we use every day nearly always feels 'simpler' and of course more natural.

What killed me when I lived in NZ was that my mates used the metric in the weirdest way possible - say quoting a 10 meter luff in ... millimeters. Now that's what a call freaking accuracy. A plain 11.32 luff became an 11320 luff - something that did puzzle my metric (apparently) brain.

Other than such funnies, I am happy with whatever system you throw at me - be it metric, imperial, binary or hex.

I can only say then that a systems can't dumb you down but it can indeed make your lack of general computing prowess stand out in the educated crowd.

Cheers,
b.

[StuM]

Originally Posted by drew23

you know, I've ranted about this for years - but here's the rub.

I've long since forgiven Americans for not using metric - it's not your fault, it's just what you were taught. HOWEVER, there's one thing that I believe Americans have done to the metric system that frankly I find unconscionable!

Metric is used in nearly every country in the world (so around 195 countries, give or take), and the units have been translated into almost every spoken language on the planet.

it's a simple system: a prefix declaring the scope, in multiples of ten, of a base unit. kilo for thousands, milli for thousandths, giga for billions. kilograms. millimeters. gigabytes. AND SO FORTH.

but there is one - ONE! - unit of measurement, in one - ONE! - spoken language that bugs the ever-loving **** out of me, and frankly even though it's pervasive to the entire english-speaking world, I'm pretty sure you Americans started it, and spread it via your admittedly amazing movies and television.

that unit is the kilometer.

Nope, that unit is the kilometre, not kilometer.
Just like the volume is litre, not liter.

(It's metric, not meteric )

[Jason Flare]

Originally Posted by drew23

you know, I've ranted about this for years - but here's the rub.

I've long since forgiven Americans for not using metric - it's not your fault, it's just what you were taught. HOWEVER, there's one thing that I believe Americans have done to the metric system that frankly I find unconscionable!

Metric is used in nearly every country in the world (so around 195 countries, give or take), and the units have been translated into almost every spoken language on the planet.

it's a simple system: a prefix declaring the scope, in multiples of ten, of a base unit. kilo for thousands, milli for thousandths, giga for billions. kilograms. millimeters. gigabytes. AND SO FORTH.

but there is one - ONE! - unit of measurement, in one - ONE! - spoken language that bugs the ever-loving **** out of me, and frankly even though it's pervasive to the entire english-speaking world, I'm pretty sure you Americans started it, and spread it via your admittedly amazing movies and television.

that unit is the kilometer.

remember the rules? prefix-unit. KILO is pronounced KILL-oh. METER is pronounced MEE-turr. say it with me: KILL-oh-MEE-turr.

now say it like you almost certainly normally do: kill-AWW-meh-turr.

now try saying ANY OTHER UNIT IN THE METRIC system that way. gig-AWW-bytes. mill-IMM-iturs. kill-AWW-grums.

my anthopologic hypothesis is that during the Korean war, US military intelligence switched to using kilometers as the base unit for maps - "clicks", in grunt terms. when the word 'kilometer' came to light as the root of 'clicks', young US soldiers pronounced the word in the same way they'd pronounce other similar words, like "speedometer", or "tachometer"... I have no proof of this, but it sounds pretty good.

still, IT MAKES NO SENSE, and you're SAYING IT WRONG. the system is *very* clear! prefix-unit! the pronunciation of the prefix on its' own ("kilo") and the unit on its' own ("meter") works for EVERY OTHER UNIT OF MEASUREMENT. mega. byte. kilo. gram.

ONE unit of measurement, in ONE language.

sure, you'll dismiss me - but mark my words: there is a great and secret war occurring right under your noses, and history will determine who wins. pick your side! join me in pronouncing it KILL-oh-meter!

(...and now that you've noticed it, you'll *always* notice it! ahahahahah!)

We do it so we know if we're talking to one of our own. Capice Leftenant?

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by StuM

Nope, that unit is the kilometre, not kilometer.
Just like the volume is litre, not liter.

(It's metric, not meteric )

Thanks StuM. This post proves that at least two of can spell and can understand the enormous difference between metre and meter. I can only assume most of the other non-US citizens just go with the flow of their US spell checkers, once again allowing the 'puter to do their thinking for 'em.

[buzzstar]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Thanks StuM. This post proves that at least two of can spell and can understand the enormous difference between metre and meter. I can only assume most of the other non-US citizens just go with the flow of their US spell checkers, once again allowing the 'puter to do their thinking for 'em.

Have you ever tried to fight with a spell checker? They are relentless!