why is the US not Metric

[bsfeechannel]

Yes. Many other cultures/nations have historically had relatively little to preserve in comparison to the US in this aspect. This is partly because America was one of the world leaders of technological advancement from the late 1800's to today. Significant portion of this boon occurred before America even had access to metric prototypes, being on the wrong side of the globe. The foundation for a lot of today's tech was laid out in inches, in America. And the reason this worked is because America used consistently sized feet and inches across its borders. They had that sorted out from the beginning of this boon. Russia's system was a complete mess until the change over to metric.

We were also in a tech race against the Axis and then the Soviet Union for many decades, post WWII.

In other words, the world has accomplished nothing.

rstofer has already said that (with a lot less words, thankfully). What he and you are basically saying is that the US resists metrication because of this (false) perception that the rest of world simply watched passively the US become the US. So the world has no right to "tell" the US that metrication is a great idea.

For the rest of the world, such perception is viewed as a sick and pathetic complex of superiority that makes US end up looking like it has accomplished nothing.

This has already been discussed many times in this thread, but you are intentionally blind to anything that doesn't fit your narrative.

I have particularly addressed this multiple times along this thread, but you insist with your theories, even though we have repeatedly debunked them.

Secondly, you assume all other countries other than US and Myanmar have voluntarily abandoned their customary measures in order to "get the most" out of metric, when in fact most of the globe changed to metric during regime changes that destroyed other parts of national culture and government. And even then, there is still use of traditional measuring systems in many countries besides the US.

The US independence was a regime change that radically destroyed a lot of traditions, the record of which is petrified in the Constitution, and inspired similar movements all over the world.

Why didn't the US take advantage of that and switched to metric right from the start?

[MT]

Let me just chime in this havoced thread allready at post 4 that GRETA+SOROS+AU climatologists says 500million animals have died in the last AU fires, in return i requested a scientific executed count report of this hard and meticulously done survey but was brutally ignored! 

[TimFox]

the litre is only approximately 1000 cm³

Say what?! 

I double-checked.  The liter was defined as the volume of 1 kg of water at maximum density, until 1964.  The original definition of the gram was the mass of one cubic centimeter of water, but the later production of the prototype kilogram made for a slight difference between the litre and 1000 cubic centimeters.  The SI unit of volume is, logically, the cubic meter.  In 1964, the liter was re-defined to correspond to the cubic decimeter.

[ebastler]

Sorry, that does not sound any clearer to me. To put it plain and simple: One liter has always been exactly the 1/1000 part of a cubic meter. It is the definition of the kg which has changed, from the earlier definition as "the mass of 1 liter of water", (edit: via a definition as "the mass of the reference kg kept in Paris"), to a definition based on Planck's constant.

Edit again: Heck, you might be right?! Reading up on the definition of the liter seems to contradict what I read on the definition of the kg... Forget my above comments for now, but I'll need to dig deeper. Hard to understand that liter and meter would have been two independent definitions for a while...

[TimFox]

As I understand the history, the liter was originally defined as 1000 cubic centimeters.  The gram was originally defined as the mass of one cubic centimeter of water.  The prototype kilogram was then fabricated to agree with that definition.  However, due to the temperature dependence of water’s density (and perhaps the difficulty of measuring the volume of liquid water due to meniscus) there was a small discrepancy between the prototype kilogram and a liter of water.  I took chemistry in high school just before the 1964 redefinition.  Between 1901 and 1964, the liter was defined as the volume of 1 kg of water, slightly different from 1000 cubic centimeters.  The graduated cylinders and pipettes we had in chemistry lab probably couldn’t tell the difference.  However, careful weighing might well resolve the difference between the two definitions.

[boffin]

I said it before, I'll say it again, the majority of the United States hasn't gone metric because of arrogance. 

Trying to argue logic with them will always fail, they just assume the rest of the world will have to deal with what they do.

[ebastler]

As I understand the history, the liter was originally defined as 1000 cubic centimeters.  The gram was originally defined as the mass of one cubic centimeter of water.  The prototype kilogram was then fabricated to agree with that definition.  However, due to the temperature dependence of water’s density (and perhaps the difficulty of measuring the volume of liquid water due to meniscus) there was a small discrepancy between the prototype kilogram and a liter of water.  I took chemistry in high school just before the 1964 redefinition.  Between 1901 and 1964, the liter was defined as the volume of 1 kg of water, slightly different from 1000 cubic centimeters.  The graduated cylinders and pipettes we had in chemistry lab probably couldn’t tell the difference.  However, careful weighing might well resolve the difference between the two definitions.

Yes, that seems to be the sequence of events. Very strange to me that they accepted an inconsistency in the definitions of volume and length -- only to protect the definition that the density of water is exactly 1 kg/liter. (But not 1 g/cm³.  )  Well, reassuringly the view that this was a bad idea took hold by 1964...

Apologies for my doubts, and thanks for your patience.

So here's another argument for all fans of the imperial system: "We don't want anything to do with those flaky SI units!"   

[TimFox]

An important feature of this history is the change and improvements in measurement technology.  Originally, the meter was defined by geography, and the second by astronomy.  Then came the platinum-iridium prototype meter, which was replaced by a spectroscopic wavelength.  Meanwhile, the second’s definition changed from tropical year 1900 (traceable, but difficult to recreate) to another atomic transition (measurable to very high resolution).  When laser technology improved to produce a narrower line, it became possible to measure the temporal frequency and spatial wavelength simultaneously, so that the ratio (speed of light) could be measured to better resolution than the spectral line of Kr-86.  At that point, the meter was redefined again in terms of light-seconds.  In each step, the goal was a new definition, consistent with the older one, but measurable to better resolution.

[KL27x]

In other words, the world has accomplished nothing.

No. The world accomplished a metric shit ton of things between 1870 and 2000. A lot of this was accomplished in metric. The combustion engine is one notable example which spurred a round of investment and activity in the late 1870's. This occurred fully in metric in Germany and Japan. Their tools, lathes, mills were metric. These same things were accomplished concurrently in the US and UK, but all in inches. And so it went from there until the 21st century. Including things like the Mesta hydraulic press, which requires like 6 city blocks to operate. The US changed pharmaceutical industry and chemistry to metric very early, because it made it much easier to tap into the body of knowledge and standards created in metric by the rest of the world, which was ahead of the US in these fields at the time. The US continued using imperial for many endeavor where it was and is equally as good, simply using a magic decoder ring if/when necessary to convert.

In the process of building things like combustion engines and 500 ton hydraulic presses and aircraft carriers, one might be able to imagine that a certain body of knowledge. When you build something like a Mesta press or a Hubble telescope or the first nuclear reactor, you are taking a leap of faith that what you think you know is right. And sometimes it doesn't work the first try. You lean on your body of knowledge and previous experience as much as science. You have to know not just what you can imagine, but how that will turn out when you actually try to make it. The devil is in the details.

The civil engineer doesn't build the roads and buildings. The physicist doesn't build the bomb parts. You have to know what your 200 lb gorillas can do. Last I checked, American houses and roads and bridges work pretty good, even though they are build using USC. Well, other than the FIU bridge, lol.

When you order a PCB, you get some result back. Some manufacturer might be more accurate and consistent than the other. When you find the one you like, you order from them and ask for the same thing. W/e you did, do that again. You probably don't care how they do it.

Same way that any joint NATO exercise with France isn't going to try to teach French artillery what a degree is. NATO command will let the French hit the target how they are trained.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

rstofer has already said that (with a lot less words, thankfully). What he and you are basically saying is that the US resists metrication because of this (false) perception that the rest of world simply watched passively the US become the US. So the world has no right to "tell" the US that metrication is a great idea.

rstofer never said that, to my knowledge. I did not say this. Furthermore, I disagree with 90% of what rstopher has said in this thread. (And probably 50% of what he has said in any other thread).

For the rest of the world, such perception is viewed as a sick and pathetic complex of superiority that makes US end up looking like it has accomplished nothing.

You and Boffin don't speak for the rest of the world, thankfully for the rest of the world.

This has already been discussed many times in this thread, but you are intentionally blind to anything that doesn't fit your narrative.

I have particularly addressed this multiple times along this thread, but you insist with your theories, even though we have repeatedly debunked them.

LOL. Who is "we?" You and Boffin?  Keep up the good work, fellas. The truth is out there.

The US independence was a regime change that radically destroyed a lot of traditions, the record of which is petrified in the Constitution, and inspired similar movements all over the world.

yep.

Why didn't the US take advantage of that and switched to metric right from the start?

You know the Declaration of Independence was in 1774? And the war ended 1783? And metric wasn't even an idea? Jefferson requested a set of prototypes in the 1790's, before France had even adopted the metric system, yet. But as we know, pirates. So he improved the system(s) America already used. Later, America's first attempt to standardize weights and measures with Britain also failed, due to inconsistency of the prototypes. It was decades later that we got that sorted, this time also truncating digits to get exact ratios with metric. America made strong efforts to standardize with the rest of the world since its very inception/birth, and it was a member of the origianal 17 nations at the first Metre Convention. Canada, Australia? No, they were nowhere to be seen. They joined, later.

Please, debunk me. You have nitpicked a sentence here or there to no effect. I, otoh, trashed your "metric roads save 10% maintenance cost" BS, and you just ran away. Lots of people from Canada and Britain have debunked your claim that America is the only country using imperial, today. Lots of other countries besides UK and Candad use imperial standards for plumbing, as well, just because that's how it was done before and it only causes more problems to change. So please go ahead debunk me. And if you can, tell us what magical change will happen when we change road signs to km/h.

Wait, lemme guess your response:
Everyone else did it. Murica FREEDOM is dumb. BTW, making fun of America is fine. But making fun of freedom? Why do you guys do that? Chinese influence? C'mon and fix this face to face. No, you just lie in wait to spout more bullshit later, when you feel no one will notice how full of shit you are.

[vwestlife]

For the record, the U.S. "officially" went Metric in 1979. It was only a few years behind the UK and Canada at the time. But the conservative governments that took over all three nations in the '80s (Reagan, Thatcher, and Mulroney) put a stop to any further Metrication efforts.

Canada was the furthest along at the time and as a result uses Metric for most things except construction, cooking, and paper sizes. The UK was about halfway through Metrication and ended up with strange combinations such as measuring driving distances in miles, but buying fuel in liters. The U.S. had made the least progress when the plug was pulled, so kids learn the Metric system in science class in school and some products are primarily sold in Metric units (such as 2 liter bottles of soda) but we use U.S. Customary (not "Imperial") units for almost everything else in everyday life.

[bsfeechannel]

rstofer never said that, to my knowledge. I did not say this.

You need to update your knowledge.

rstofer said that explicitly several times. You have done that with a lot more words and with a suave rhetoric but in essence you both speak the same thing.

You and Boffin don't speak for the rest of the world, thankfully for the rest of the world.

This is what I have seen everywhere, even on this forum. I suggest you pay more attention to how declarations, like those you (and rstofer-like people) do, ring in the ears of people from the other parts of the planet.

LOL. Who is "we?" You and Boffin? 

No. We, the world.

You know the Declaration of Independence was in 1774? And the war ended 1783? And metric wasn't even an idea? Jefferson requested a set of prototypes in the 1790's, before France had even adopted the metric system, yet. But as we know, pirates. So he improved the system(s) America already used. Later, America's first attempt to standardize weights and measures with Britain also failed, due to inconsistency of the prototypes. It was decades later that we got that sorted, this time also truncating digits to get exact ratios with metric. America made strong efforts to standardize with the rest of the world since its very inception/birth, and it was a member of the origianal 17 nations at the first Metre Convention. Canada, Australia? No, they were nowhere to be seen. They joined, later.

Please, debunk me.

What is there to be debunked? You're just telling us how the US missed the opportunity to go metric early on. So I just have to shrug.

You have nitpicked a sentence here or there to no effect. I, otoh, trashed your "metric roads save 10% mainetenace cost" BS, and you just ran away.

That was a straw man argument. We are not discussing how to metricate the roads in the US. Nevertheless, it was easily debunked when we showed that the world, with a lot more roads and a lot less money, made it happen.

We can open a new thread about that if you insist. But here we are discussing why the US is not metric.

Lots of people from Canada and Britain have debunked your claim that America is the only country using imperial, today. So please go ahead debunk me.

With pleasure. The fallacy of your arguments reside in that, because you found a rusty imperially threaded screw tossed in the streets of Paris, France is using imperial as widespread as it is in the US.

No. The only major country that has not adopted metric to the point of its units and concepts permeate the everyday life of the common citizen is the US.

Wait, lemme guess your response:
Everyone else did it. Murica FREEDOM is dumb. BTW, making fun of America is fine. But making fun of freedom? Why do you guys do that? Chinese influence?

You, rstofer and others are confusing this discussion with making fun of the US.

I am not doing this. Although we have to recognize that some aspects of the state of affairs when it comes to units of measure in the US are perceived as ridiculous by people inside and outside the US.

[KL27x]

This is what I have seen everywhere, even on this forum. I suggest you pay more attention to how declarations, like those you (and rstofer-like people) do, ring in the ears of people from the other parts of the planet.

I don't speak for America, I speak for myself. And in particular, I refute any association with Rstopher. I disagree with a lot of what he posts, even in other threads, as it happens.

No. We, the world.

If you "see everywhere, even on this forum," then you know no one else agrees with you, except maybe boffin. "The world" does not stand behind your words, here. People from all countries recognize that you have made many serious errors, and that your remaining argument is childish and simplistic.

That was a straw man argument.

You still don't know what this word means. 
YOU started out in this thread by citing economic benefits and improvement in science and engineering that the US would reap if the government mandated use of metric-only to "Jack and Jane." Now you backtrack after your attempt at backing your claims turned out to be a complete failure. So what's left for you to say? We're all listening.

With pleasure. The fallacy of your arguments reside in that, because you found a rusty imperially threaded screw tossed in the streets of Paris, France is using imperial as widespread as it is in the US.

You didn't read this thread much. We have members who have lived in French Canada who are telling you they use imperial for height and weight. That they have inch-only tape measure in Home Depot, by default, unless you ask.

here is just one such post, recently, from Skymaster:

In Canada, the usage of some imperial unit is not limited to English speaking Canadians. I live in the province of Quebec, my first tongue is French, and inches and pound are still casually being used in Quebec. People height and weight are often expressed using imperial units. I do woodworking using exclusively imperial units. Wood comes in 8 foot length (and 10, 12 etc), plywood sheets are 4 x 8, etc.

Canada is officially all metric, but grocery store still display the price in $ per pound, in large characters, but at the counter the price is charged per kilograms. The fact that it makes the price appears lower is probably influencing this practice, but still, anybody who is 41 years old, or less, was officially only exposed to metric units all is life.

No. The only major country that has not adopted metric to the point of its units and concepts permeate the everyday life of the common citizen is the US.

Your life is permeated with metric units and concepts? In America, our lives are permeated with living.

You have done that with a lot more words and with a suave rhetoric

Thank you. I know I can make a logical and persuasive argument. You... well, you have the power of knowing metric-only, which by your reckoning makes you an expert at metric (which takes about 1 day of class and a quiz to learn). Maybe you can persuade French Canadians as to the benefits of learning and using English-only. You can open their eyes to how inefficient is it to learn two redundant languages to say the same things?

[SkyMaster]

...
... America made strong efforts to standardize with the rest of the world since its very inception/birth, and it was a member of the original 17 nations at the first Metre Convention. Canada, Australia? No, they were nowhere to be seen. They joined, later.
...

Sorry, we missed the first Metre Convention. In 1875, Canada was busy creating the Supreme Court of Canada and building the Canadian Pacific Railway.

[SkyMaster]

...
... We have members who have lived in French Canada who are telling you they use imperial for height and weight. ...

Our ovens are cooking in Fahrenheit too. We can prepare a cake using all metric units and the cake will happily accept to be cooked in Fahrenheit. The cake is not even complaining. I think this is amazing.

And car tires pressure... in psi. No matter what is the tire country of origin, the tire will accept pressure in psi. I think this is amazing too.

Will a cake cooked in Celsius taste better? Will a tire with its pressure measured in... well I don't even know what is the metric unit used for tire pressure (and I don't care what it is), but will the tire handle better with its pressure measured in metric?

[vk6zgo]

Let me just chime in this havoced thread allready at post 4 that GRETA+SOROS+AU climatologists says 500million animals have died in the last AU fires, in return i requested a scientific executed count report of this hard and meticulously done survey but was brutally ignored! 

The estimate of 500,000,000 (not from the "boogey people", by the way, but from State & Federal authorities), is for the current fires. Your "scientifically executed count" is not practicable, as safety is of the utmost importance, & we don't want people wandering around in the path of a fire "counting".

Farmers have a pretty good idea of how many animals they have.
If they have a measurable number of animals surviving,the figures for overall losses can be pretty accurate.

Native animals are another question, & can only be determined statistically.
Some animals are fast enough to make a good try at escaping the fires, others, like koalas have little chance of escape.
Snakes, & most lizards are very unlikely to survive.

You want "brutal", have a look at some of the news videos of the fires!

[tooki]

I said it before, I'll say it again, the majority of the United States hasn't gone metric because of arrogance. 

Trying to argue logic with them will always fail, they just assume the rest of the world will have to deal with what they do.

You can repeat that as many times as you want, but it still won’t make it true.

Besides, your argument here clearly ignores the numerous Americans in this thread who’ve used logic both to acknowledge the benefits metric has, as well as to debunk the stupid claims (like arrogance) about why USA hasn’t embraced metric, and have provided clear, compelling explanations as to why USA has not done so.

The overwhelming lion’s share of arrogance in this thread is from the pro-metric nuts who refuse to accept the actual reasons the USA hasn’t switched entirely.

[Cubdriver]

I said it before, I'll say it again, the majority of the United States hasn't gone metric because of arrogance. 

Trying to argue logic with them will always fail, they just assume the rest of the world will have to deal with what they do.

And you'll still be wrong.  The US has 'gone metric' in areas where it makes sense to us to do so.  This has been pointed out ad nauseam in this thread, but there still seem to be some who simply refuse to get it.  There is arrogance and stubbornness here, but I think you're attributing it to the wrong parties.

-Pat

[KL27x]

The overwhelming lion’s share of arrogance in this thread is from the pro-metric nuts who refuse to accept the actual reasons the USA hasn’t switched entirely.

I would clarify that most of the pro-metric participants in this thread are not nut jobs. There's a vocal minority which I refuse to apply to the rest of this group.

The english speaking internet, at large, is very pro-metric, IMO. But my thoughts in hindsight of having been one, myself, are that coeds are extremely easy to influence, idealistic, inclined to align themselves with vocal leaders, and they think they know everything. And they universally have access to the internet and too much time on their hands. My crystal ball says that college kids/voters will be instrumental to the end of America and will pat themselves on the back while Rome burns.

[MT]

The estimate of 500,000,000 (not from the "boogey people", by the way, but from State & Federal authorities), is for the current fires. Your "scientifically executed count" is not practicable, as safety is of the utmost importance, & we don't want people wandering around in the path of a fire "counting".

Farmers have a pretty good idea of how many animals they have.
If they have a measurable number of animals surviving,the figures for overall losses can be pretty accurate.

Native animals are another question, & can only be determined statistically.
Some animals are fast enough to make a good try at escaping the fires, others, like koalas have little chance of escape.
Snakes, & most lizards are very unlikely to survive.

You want "brutal", have a look at some of the news videos of the fires!

That is one of the points, 500million is a silly estimation, noone is out and counting. Now the second point the reporting "on top" in contrast to yours "down under" is entirely focused on that the AU fires is due to "climate change" therefore GRETA and Soros try to exploit this for their agenda to make "number" out of that 500millon animals. its called "fear mongering".Well sure as hell they dont bother count all the insects burning do they? No of course not.

[bsfeechannel]

And in particular, I refute any association with Rstopher. I disagree with a lot of what he posts, even in other threads, as it happens.

But in this thread, your arguments are just his plus frills.

People from all countries recognize that you have made many serious errors, and that your remaining argument is childish and simplistic.

If my arguments are wrong, childish and simplistic, how do I always manage to question yours?

YOU started out in this thread by citing economic benefits and improvement in science and engineering that the US would reap if the government mandated use of metric-only to "Jack and Jane." Now you backtrack after your attempt at backing your claims turned out to be a complete failure.

Nope. I started out in this thread questioning your argument that the US is not metricated because it costs money. Well, no one said that the change would be free. My argument back then was that the whole world managed to go metric and paid for it. No problem. You still can't accept that your argument doesn't hold water.

You didn't read this thread much. We have members who have lived in French Canada who are telling you they use imperial for height and weight. That they have inch-only tape measure in Home Depot, by default, unless you ask.

Since when you give a damn what the Canadians do?

[bsfeechannel]

And you'll still be wrong.  The US has 'gone metric' in areas where it makes sense to us to do so.  This has been pointed out ad nauseam in this thread, but there still seem to be some who simply refuse to get it.

And this argument has been equally debunked ad nauseam in this thread. The US "gone metric where it makes sense" only defeats the purpose of metrication, which is to reduce the clutter and confusion of units.
 
Instead of ditching imperial and replacing with metric, you ADDED metric to an already cumbersome system.

Geez. I don't know if I agree with boffin, but I'm starting to understand why he says what he says.

[vk6zgo]

The estimate of 500,000,000 (not from the "boogey people", by the way, but from State & Federal authorities), is for the current fires. Your "scientifically executed count" is not practicable, as safety is of the utmost importance, & we don't want people wandering around in the path of a fire "counting".

Farmers have a pretty good idea of how many animals they have.
If they have a measurable number of animals surviving,the figures for overall losses can be pretty accurate.

Native animals are another question, & can only be determined statistically.
Some animals are fast enough to make a good try at escaping the fires, others, like koalas have little chance of escape.
Snakes, & most lizards are very unlikely to survive.

You want "brutal", have a look at some of the news videos of the fires!

That is one of the points, 500million is a silly estimation, noone is out and counting. Now the second point the reporting "on top" in contrast to yours "down under" is entirely focused on that the AU fires is due to "climate change" therefore GRETA and Soros try to exploit this for their agenda to make "number" out of that 500millon animals. its called "fear mongering".Well sure as hell they dont bother count all the insects burning do they? No of course not.

Most people in Australia have only vaguely heard of Soros, & Greta is a schoolgirl for Pete's sake!
Why would we make up numbers to make either of them happy?

My other question is,
"Why the hell are we having this discussion in the middle of a thread about Metrication?"

If you can remember which thread you were originally answering, maybe the Moderators can shift us to that one.

[bsfeechannel]

For those coming now to this thread let's summarize it. This thread managed to debunk the following ideas.

1)  Metric is French, communist and Eurocentric.
2)  The US will hand over its sovereignty to France if they adopt metric.
3)  The US is metricated where it makes sense.
4)  The US is not metric because the conversion costs money.
5)  The rest of the world has accomplished nothing.
6)  Since the US is the only nation that has accomplished something, the US can afford to skip metrication.
7)  Ι've seen someone buy an inch-only tape measure outside the US. The world is imperial just like the US.
8 )  Metrication can only occur under a general cultural and political upheaval.
9)  Metricated countries are ashamed of their culture and history.
10) The US is not metric because they are proud of their culture and history.
11) Pilots are proud of their ignorance about the units they use every day.
12) Those who decide to investigate all these false claims are arrogant pro-metric nut jobs.

This is just a short list. Help to expand it.

[CatalinaWOW]

And you'll still be wrong.  The US has 'gone metric' in areas where it makes sense to us to do so.  This has been pointed out ad nauseam in this thread, but there still seem to be some who simply refuse to get it.

And this argument has been equally debunked ad nauseam in this thread. The US "gone metric where it makes sense" only defeats the purpose of metrication, which is to reduce the clutter and confusion of units.
 
Instead of ditching imperial and replacing with metric, you ADDED metric to an already cumbersome system.

Geez. I don't know if I agree with boffin, but I'm starting to understand why he says what he says.

The arrogance of the US is similar to the arrogance of most of the world in not converting to a decimal time system, decimal angles, and a rationalized calendar.  All of which would have advantages similar to those touted for the metric system.  (Except for standardization and the force mass thing which are real benefits of metric and are why metric is used in the US in places where those advantages matter.)

[CatalinaWOW]

For those coming now to this thread let's summarize it. This thread managed to debunk the following ideas.

1)  Metric is French, communist and Eurocentric.
2)  The US will hand over its sovereignty to France if they adopt metric.
3)  The US is metricated where it makes sense.
4)  The US is not metric because the conversion costs money.
5)  The rest of the world has accomplished nothing.
6)  Since the US is the only nation that has accomplished something, the US can afford to skip metrication.
7)  Ι've seen someone buy an inch-only tape measure outside the US. The world is imperial just like the US.
8 )  Metrication can only occur under a general cultural and political upheaval.
9)  Metricated countries are ashamed of their culture and history.
10) The US is not metric because they are proud of their culture and history.
11) Pilots are proud of their ignorance about the units they use every day.
12) Those who decide to investigate all these false claims are arrogant pro-metric nut jobs.

This is just a short list. Help to expand it.

13) Non--metric is bad because I have non-metric in my old gear.
14) Metric is good because I am comfortable with it.
15) Standardization is good when it is metric, irrelevant when not.
16) Some French intellectuals said everything should be done in powers of 10, and we will worship that when it supports the system I use, but ignore it when the system I use has not caught up to the ideal of those intellectuals.
17) Those who provide first hand reports of non-metric usage are clearly American zealots and should be ignored.
18)  Whenever the thread settles into some sort of rational agreement one of the zealots on one side of the fence or the other dives in and rehashes the same old arguments.

I think 18) really covers it all pretty well.