Re: EU abandons plans to force metricity on the UK


"John of Aix" <j.murphy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:46e6cffe$0$25942$ba4acef3@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
John Youles wrote:

Actually I believe some think that this is the reason why we use the
dodecimal system, because fo the 12 phalanges on the four fingers.


If there was a metric system based on twelve there would be a lot
more going for it, as twelve is a more useful base than ten as it has
more factors. With the decimal system even a simple fraction like a
third has to be expressed with recurring digits.

True enough but it gives lots of work to bureaucrats?

The official SI definition of a meter is the length of the path
travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458
of a second. That's not really easy to measure and understand, is it
?

What is a foot? I mean as a precise unit (there isn't a SI one I suppose).
There must be a metal rod somewhere, at Greenwich maybe....or perhaps not,
a quick look on Wikipedia tells me that there are several 'foots' of
varying size and that the sizes themselves have varied over time. At least
the metre bears a relationship to a fixed and universal measurement, the
speed of light in a vacuum.

Regardless I don't tend to carry around apparatus that can put a space in a
vacuum so I can time how long it takes for light to travel around from one
end to the other and thus work out the distance.

What I use is a tape or laser measure.

Obviously Mr Youles is not so practically minded.


.

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