The rulers we used through elementary school and high school all had imperial and metric on them. I always assumed that meant you pick a standard and use it, which was generally metric.
Then I heard my sisters discussing the height of Merry and Pippin by the end of LotR, and they agreed they stood over 4'5". However, they didn't know how tall they actually got and my one sister made the point that "they could have been only four feet, five inches, and one centimetre."
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
I lived in barcelona this summer, and people sometimes asked me how tall i was, as I am taller than the average Spaniard (I am a white american).
I finally did the math, I am 6 feet, and it is something like 170 centimeters. It actually surprised me that the europeans I met, Spanish, German, French, Italian, had NO idea what a foot looked like, NONE. YOu think they might spend one day on it in middle school just for the sake of trivia?
I actually enjoy the american system, because we use things in a sort of mixed up and eclectic way, for instance anything really small is mm, a good size bottle of water is a liter, your heigth and weight are in English, your car gets 3 leads to the hogshead, etc. at least we don't trade in Guineas and buy land by the furlong anymore.
Posted by luthe (Member # 1601) on :
well it is simpler than saying four feet 5.393700787 inches
Posted by Black Mage (Member # 5800) on :
I personally prefer metric, no matter what. It's just so much more accurate.
Of course, that makes trouble when I only remember matric dimensions to fill out forms. Even my measurements for suits, I know them only in metric.
Posted by ReikoDemosthenes (Member # 6218) on :
Oddly enough, I'm more familiar with imperial, here. One would think, being in Canada, that I'd use metric more, but it seems that people never quite switched completely so the main places I use metric are things like drivers license (which I require a conversion to figure out) and such. Oh, and math and physics text books. They use metric as well.
Posted by breyerchic04 (Member # 6423) on :
I measure things in hands. A hand is 4 inches.
Posted by kojabu (Member # 8042) on :
Is that based on a base of palm to top of palm measurement?
Posted by tmservo (Member # 8552) on :
Centimeters have often brought me confusion In Speaker of the Dead, the piggies are often described in centimeters, and it confuses the bejesus out of me ..
When they say "learned to walk when not even 10 centimeters" I always think "is that even an inch high?" Posted by breyerchic04 (Member # 6423) on :
It's based on horse measurements, but I think it was orginally from the width of a huge hand .
Posted by ReikoDemosthenes (Member # 6218) on :
quote:When they say "learned to walk when not even 10 centimeters" I always think "is that even an inch high?"
That just sounds so amusing to me. Despite the fact that I, and many others, here, use imperial predominantly, I'm used to people at least recognising roughly how big a centimetre is.
Is it common at all to have both systems on rulers or measuring tapes in the States?
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
Yep. Most rulers and tapes have both. And I, at least, learned both in school. I have a pretty good grasp on the distance measurments, less so on weight and volume, and least of all on temperature, although that's getting better.
Posted by kojabu (Member # 8042) on :
Dude, that's still tiny, only about 3 inches.
It's funny, American measuring cups are righthanded, such that if you hold it with your right hand, the cups side is facing you. My lefthanded friend had our Candian friend get him a Canadian measuring cup so that when he held it in his left hand, the cups side faced him.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
I use both metric and imperial, depending on what happens to be the most applicable at the time. If we're talking math, metric is easier. But I think of people in feet, same with windows, and tables and things, especially if they were made prior to the metric switchover. I never use yards, though, or miles.
I think I still use the feet and inches because it would be better if we had 2.5 centimetre and quarter-metre measurements because there are certain things which require these medium-sized measurements!
Posted by Airguitarist (Member # 2647) on :
Yeah, I've always wondered why the decimeter (or deca? Whichever means 1/10 of a meter) never caught on. It seems like such a usefull size.
Posted by HollowEarth (Member # 2586) on :
quote: I have a pretty good grasp on the distance measurments, less so on weight and volume, and least of all on temperature, although that's getting better.
Well, the temperature one is understandable. The Celsius scale is not meant to be a climate scale, and doesn't make any sense at all for measuring air temperature. Farenheit is simply a better scale for that kind of thing. I always feel sorry for Europeans when they have to talk about things being 20-something Celcius; it's almost like their ability to report the weather has been crippled in some fashion.
Posted by aspectre (Member # 2222) on :
"It actually surprised me that the europeans I met, Spanish, German, French, Italian, had NO idea what a foot looked like"
Which explains European shoe designers. Just tell 'em a foot is the distance light travels in one nanosecond. It woulda helped if ya'd said that you're ~183centimetres tall, insteada telling them that you're 5feet7inches.
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In Speaker of the Dead, the piggies are often described in centimeters, and it confuses the bejesus out of me ..