why is the US not Metric

[KL27x]

scale it by a factor of 5

Can't you scale dimensions in any unit, though? Can you elaborate?

Of course you can. It's just more difficult, than sticking with one unit. You could scale linear measurements in inches just as easily as cm, or metres and the same could be said about a recipe in oz vs grammes. The problem occurs with imperial is more than one unit is normally necessary. Any tape measure longer than 60", has both feet and inches.

This part is curious. I have never seen this inch tape of whoever mentioned it, which rolls over at 12 inches and starts going by feet plus 1-11 inches. I think your countries made these as part of the metrication effort. 

In reality you'll have 6"8', rather than 80", unless you're working on something quite small, which makes life harder, than just using cm.

Well, I wouldn't say 6'-7' is "quite small." And 80"? What's wrong with that? In metric you add a couple zeros to everything and it's still fine. It's just another way to look at it. I think we like math, or something.

and weighing scales, for masses over a few pounds, have both pounds and oz.

Yeah, true 'nuff. 675 grams x 5? Easy enough, I guess. 5 x 75 is 200 plus 3000? 3200 grams? edit: oops I screwd that up, lol. 3400 grams? edit edit: oh, 3,375? I mean, I'd probably do that in my sleep if I used metric all my life. It's just different.
 
1 lb 13 oz in your head? That's 10 lbs minus 15 oz. 9 lbs 1 oz? Dunno if that's so hard, but ok. Honestly, I don't have a scale to weigh pounds and oz, other than a bathroom scale. By the time you need paper and pencil and/or a calculator, what difference does it make, anywa?   

Also, most industries don't like cm's at all, as it were. I think they're used in sewing or something. Machining and construction work are meters or mm's only, in many countries. It's reflected in calipers, for instance. So much for the infinite versatility, in practice.

My point was just use one measurement, so keep it to degrees, as it's what everyone uses and the benefits of multiples of 10 don't apply to angles.

Degrees, arcminiutes and arcseconds are pretty close to an optimum system.

You kinda just slapped metric in the face. You're making an exception because of history/standard/popularity. I don't see France getting rid of the grad, anytime soon.

We use imperial for the highest levels of precision manufacturing/machining

As did the UK and most of Europe until we realised metric was easier to use, so we migrated towards it.

Yeah, every country used the only things they have available at the time. But I don't think most of Europe was equally deeply invested in mass-manufacturing/machining tech before switching to metric. W/e qualified as that in mid 1800's was not the kind of investment/tech that exists in UK. Multiply that a lot to start to compare to US.

It's far easier to just use the SI system which is designed from the ground up.

Sure it is, in general. Why did it take you guys over 100 years? You didn't know this from the start? Are you saying that UK's brightest minds just figured this out?

There's no point in having 50 or so different units for length, mass, volume, area, etc.

I'm with you in theory, still.

just use one.

Watching UK and waiting to see where that mess ends.

[vwestlife]

The UK is supposed to be metric, but people there still measure their weight in "stone" (1 stone = 14 pounds = 6.35 kg).

Anyway, regarding U.S. government/military contracts specifying metric units but actually being based around customary/imperial sizes, the opposite is actually much more common in consumer products. For example, 11.8 fl. oz. / 350 mL is now a very common size for plastic beverage bottles and skin care products in the U.S. (and probably internationally). Obviously 350 mL is the size the bottle was designed to be, even though "11.8 FL. OZ." is sometimes the primary volume listed, with 350 mL in smaller text underneath.

However, glass and aluminum containers are much more likely to still be made in U.S. customary sizes, since they're manufactured in bottling plants that have been around for many, many years and use equipment that is decades old, and they never saw any good reason to shut down and rebuild the entire plant, with great expense and disruption, just to change it to metric sizes.

And would a metric carton of eggs only have 10 instead of 12?

[boffin]

And would a metric carton of eggs only have 10 instead of 12?

This demonstrates perfectly the arrogance of why the US hasn't gone metric

The answer is YES, egg cartons in other countries are often 10 eggs.  Your pre-conceived notion that they must have 12 is exactly that, pre-conceived.

Have a look at the photo in the wikipedia article "Egg Carton"

[unitedatoms]

Hmm 10 eggs. But what for people with 6 fingers on each hand to do now?

[boffin]

Hmm 10 eggs. But what for people with 6 fingers on each hand to do now?

avoid Inigo Montoya ?

[Cubdriver]

And would a metric carton of eggs only have 10 instead of 12?

This demonstrates perfectly the arrogance of why the US hasn't gone metric

The answer is YES, egg cartons in other countries are often 10 eggs.  Your pre-conceived notion that they must have 12 is exactly that, pre-conceived.

Have a look at the photo in the wikipedia article "Egg Carton"

(Attachment Link)

    Now buying EGGS by the dozen shows our "arrogance".   

Should we change our lead-acid car batteries to have five cells instead of six, too?  That'd make them a nominal 10V rather than 12.  Much better to be 'metric', right?  Good lord.

-Pat

[boffin]

    Now buying EGGS by the dozen shows our "arrogance".   

I didn't say that, and I'll say it now as obviously you missed the point. 

The pre-conceived notion that it's ridiculous to sell them in anything except 12s, demonstrates that arrogance.

[Gyro]

The UK is supposed to be metric, but people there still measure their weight in "stone" (1 stone = 14 pounds = 6.35 kg).

Actually, I think most of us use kg these days, those watching their weight anyway... and certainly anything medical related.

[vwestlife]

The pre-conceived notion that it's ridiculous to sell them in anything except 12s, demonstrates that arrogance.

But exactly what is the benefit of selling eggs in quantities of 10 rather than a dozen, other than to fulfill some dictatorial mathematic regime that everything in life must be counted in powers of 10?

And also why not also change the clock to 10 hours per day and the calendar to 10 days per week, like the French tried to do?

[Electro Detective]

If they did a remake movie (PLEASE NO !   )    of The Dirty Dozen

The Dirty Ten or The Dirty Decade just hasn't got that same ring to it.


Two actors would miss out on a job 

[CatalinaWOW]

i have seen egg cartons in multiple sizes.  Nine, eighteen and twenty four in addition to the sizes mentioned previously.  As far as I know it is tradition rather than arrogance which explains why the dozen size is probably the most common in the US.  I can think of logical reasons why they might be marketed in some other sizes, though the use cases are probably rare enough that they just haven't ever made economic sense anywhere. 

Serving size for eggs is usually one or two.  So those numbers, and then multiples of them for the number dining would make some sort of sense.  So you can actually justify all sizes based on servings.  But five and seven make an awkward package shape so can be ignored immediately.  Larger sizes like 18 and 24 (and larger) probably make more sense at restaurants or other institutional settings.   Smaller refrigerators in many parts of the world would make smaller packages attractive, but since eggs store really well larger and less costly packages are also attractive in homes with the space for storage.

When you look at why egg packages should be any size, you see that the advantages are small and use case particular.  A perfect setting for long emotional arguments, just like measurement systems.

[KL27x]

LOL if any of these countries changed from 12 eggs/carton to 10 after metricating, simply to change the quantity to be base ten.

Imagine believing you were buying the wrong number of eggs your whole life after catching this terrible metric disease.

Not that is matters, but I wonder what you call it? In case there are also 5 (j/k) and 20 packs.

"Honey, pick up a dek of eggs?"
A dekaegg?
A 10 piece egg mcbucket?
Do you really just call it a "10 pack of eggs?"

The obvious thing is "pick up 10 eggs, would you, hon?" But that seems oddly specific or arbitrary when you say it. Like asking for 125 grams of pastrami. For that reason, I wonder what they say in these countries. Maybe just "a pack/box/tray/carton of eggs?" Curious minds. It sounds funny to me to say "12 eggs" in this context, even though it's efficient.

We actually say "12-packs" for beers and sodas, here, but with eggs it's mostly always by the dozen. Well, by native speakers in my own circles, anyways. Maybe English is just a stupid language?

Hmm. Twelve is faster to say than a dozen, when you're only talking a single dozen. But we like that word "dozen," anyway. Maybe if we had even more redundancy by having an extra word for 10, the way we have for 12, Americans would start to like 10-packs.  So we can buy 60 eggs, or we can buy 5 dozen eggs. Or we can buy 6 deks?

[xrunner]

What about dice?   

[bsfeechannel]

  Now buying EGGS by the dozen shows our "arrogance".   

What boffin means is that you poke fun at the metric system, which is one of the "nothings" the world has accomplished, and then you want respect from this same world.

No one uses eggs or cartons to measure length, area, volume, time, weight, etc., so they are not units of measure.

Moreover, there's this misconception that the metric system is obsessed with the number 10 and an enemy of the number 12. We are in an engineering forum, so all of you are very well acquainted with the metric system because the units we use in our trade, ohms, volts, amps, watts, hertz, seconds, farads, henries, etc. are all metric. So you know very well that the metric system is not the offspring of a sick mind.

[KL27x]

So...the way that Australians use metric in construction? They use just mm's. That's pretty easy, right? It works great, because it's all in one unit. There are no decimal places. And if you want to take a step back and visualize the scale/scope in meters, that's where the comma is. Easy.

This is why I like working in thous for PCB work. Sometimes I use inches, sometimes thous. Sometimes I change back and forth. This just changes decimal point vs comma. Thous is sometimes easier, cuz the numbers always go down to thous (instead of zeros on the end disappearing/truncating when using inches). E.g., if  adjusting a slot/hole by a few thous at a time, sometimes I don't want to go from position x.895 to x.9, where the "units" change from thous to tenths of inches just cuz it hit an arbitrary position. It is easier on your brain if the position goes from 895 to 900 (cuz you probably are going to adjust it, again, maybe to 902 or 899, as you home in on things). Sometimes inches is easier/cleaner because those zeros disappear. Depends what you are doing. But the comma and decimal point stay in the same place. Working in mm/microns is the same thing... just too much unnecessary resolution for this kind of thing. (IMO, for most things I personally do; but thous? Use them all the time). 
 
So I can see why metric is easier than using feet AND inches. But when building a house, how often are you going to use 1, 2, 3, 7, 9 mm? I think relatively rarely. The layout is going to mostly use some relatively standard chunks or grid-snap which is useful for the scale. So for the most part the engineers and 200 lb gorillas on site will be working in unit blocks or chunks of 50/100/300/450/600 mm's. A mm or 5 will have to be added/subtracted here or there to fit/adjust for cumulative errors and real life warpage/bending, on site. But mm or smidges or 1/16ths inches would be not much different for this, in practice.

This why I rather have what the metric construction guys have for my precision work, whether PCB or woodwork or machining, using CAD and/or calipers. The thous is where Sketchup and the real world meet up and make babies. In the places where these numbers are actually all over the place, and what I spend the most time manipulating and chasing after. When things get bigger, into the funny USC drunk mathematician stuff, well, now more often than not, I'm targeting and rounding off to certain numbers just because they sound better. And imperial gives you lots of drunk mathematician options for getting nice numbers, at least. 48" might be weird. But 4' is easy to remember and think about. In metric, you have all these choices of 48, or 48,000, or 0.048. It's not that it's a major advantage, of course. It's more that the inch/thous just happens to be perfect for real world practical precision, IMO, as to why I will probably never completely abandon imperial just for sake of "using only one system." I can't imagine even bothering to try to use just one system for everything. Seems needlessly complicating and limiting things (ironically).

[GlennSprigg]

A few interesting comments, regarding the last page or two...

We are generally metric now here in Australia, but being old, I prefer people's 'height' to be in
feet & inches!!  On TV, they talk of some crim being say 185cm instead of 6'1" which I can relate to.
Although I've got used to Kgs for people now. Stone & Pounds are lost on me now.

Also, regarding tape-measures, I was on a job once with a crew of Germans. They love their fold
out wooden sticks measuring devices!!  They said they were more accurate, as the metal tapes
suffer from heat expansion/contraction. However, I pointed out that where their sticks were hinged,
the 2 pieces of wood are about 6mm thick, so there is a possible 'Parallax-Error' when reading! 

[SkyMaster]

What about dice?   

You need to use 10-sided dice, else it would be a demonstration of United States arrogance to the rest of the world 

 

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

Those numbers with a line... the line goes above or below?

[TimFox]

The convention for 6 and 9 is that the line goes below the numeral.

[Gregg]

hexadecimal dice; something for everyone:

[KL27x]

The convention for 6 and 9 is that the line goes below the numeral.

Just as long as you decide before you throw them. You never know, cuz of places like Australia. They drive on the left; they call them 4x2's; record heat in December summer; the toilet flushes the wrong way, even. 

[Zero999]

Degrees, arcminiutes and arcseconds are pretty close to an optimum system.

You kinda just slapped metric in the face. You're making an exception because of history/standard/popularity.

No, I did not. You just don't understand the difference between angles and linear measurements, hence the requirement for powers of ten being unimportant. An Angle of  360 degrees, a turn, 400 gradians etc. is the same as zero, so there is no need for standard SI prefixes such as M, k, G etc. There may be rare occasions for larger numbers, i.e a screw might need to be rotated more than 360 degrees, but what we'd normally say is x number of turns.

We use imperial for the highest levels of precision manufacturing/machining

As did the UK and most of Europe until we realised metric was easier to use, so we migrated towards it.

Yeah, every country used the only things they have available at the time. But I don't think most of Europe was equally deeply invested in mass-manufacturing/machining tech before switching to metric. W/e qualified as that in mid 1800's was not the kind of investment/tech that exists in UK. Multiply that a lot to start to compare to US.

It's far easier to just use the SI system which is designed from the ground up.

Sure it is, in general. Why did it take you guys over 100 years? You didn't know this from the start? Are you saying that UK's brightest minds just figured this out?

I'm sure the educated people in the UK already knew of the superiority of the SI system. It just took a long time for the government to make it standard.

[KL27x]

No, I did not. You just don't understand the difference between angles and linear measurements, hence the requirement for powers of ten being unimportant. An Angle of  360 degrees, a turn, 400 gradians etc. is the same as zero, so there is no need for standard SI prefixes such as M, k, G etc. There may be rare occasions for larger numbers, i.e a screw might need to be rotated more than 360 degrees, but what we'd normally say is x number of turns.

What difference? Why 360? This is a kings foot, is it not? The we divide these degrees into 60 minutes. Then these into another 60 seconds. These are barley corns, aren't they?

Grads you can divide into 100ths to get metric grad minutes. Each grad on earth's surface is 100 km. Each grad-minute 1 km. Each grad-second 10 meters. Isn't this easier than division of 60ths? Yes, it is, because of our number system. But we use the king's foot and the barley corns, anyhow. It's too far gone to change it, because of so much knowledge and technology that has adopted this arbitrary standard.

Here's the other rub, though. I bet you any Frenchman is very comfortable to use or convert degrees and grads. That's just another tool they use/add. It doesn't make them retarded. Americans though. They use multiple systems, and it's arrogance/stupidity/stubbornness? It's not practical?

So basically, I still don't understand, and you're further post is not helping me to understand.

I'm sure the educated people in the UK already knew of the superiority of the SI system. It just took a long time for the government to make it standard.

The American people understand the advantages of metric. They already made it standard and have no plan/desire to deprecate/eradicate their other standard of measure. They like both.

[Electro Detective]

The convention for 6 and 9 is that the line goes below the numeral.

Just as long as you decide before you throw them. You never know, cuz of places like Australia.

They drive on the left; they call them 4x2's; record heat in December summer; the toilet flushes the wrong way, even.

  

and the right way is... 

I've never heard anyone in trade circles call it a '4x2', most copy the US thang '2x4'

record heat in December summer is the way the seasons and weather works here,

and fwiw:

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!   

---------------

The full deal:


The love of field and coppice
Of green and shaded lanes,
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins.
Strong love of grey-blue distance,
Brown streams and soft, dim skies
I know, but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!

The stark white ring-barked forests,
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon,
Green tangle of the brushes
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops,
And ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When, sick at heart, around us
We see the cattle die
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the rainbow gold,
For flood and fire and famine
She pays us back threefold.
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze ...

An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand
though Earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.


Dorothea MacKellar wrote this poem in 1908 while she was visiting England and missing her home country.
The second stanza is possibly one of the most well known and recited pieces of poetry in Australian history.

[Zero999]

What difference? Why 360? This is a kings foot, is it not? The we divide these degrees into 60 minutes. Then these into another 60 seconds. These are barley corns, aren't they?

360 is better because having more factors than 400, so ¹/₃ of a turn or 120 degrees can be expressed without using a fraction.

Grads you can divide into 100ths to get metric grad minutes. Each grad on earth's surface is 100 km. Each grad-minute 1 km. Each grad-second 10 meters. Isn't this easier than division of 60ths? Yes, it is, because of our number system.

Only at the equator, so it's not much of an advantage in most everyday applications.

So basically, I still don't understand, and you're further post is not helping me to understand.

All right, I'll give it one last try. For linear measurements, the range is zero to infinity. For angles, it's zero to nearly one. Using powers of ten for linear measurements is more of a benefit because the range of numbers is greater than, when measuring an angle which can only range between zero and one.

When you're expressing what is really a fraction, it makes sense to use a number with lots of factors, rather than a power of ten, which isn't very helpful.

Think of it another way. How often do you need to add and multiply angles together vs linear measurements?  Not very often. It's unlikely you'll have a angle such as 42^o 50' and have to add 1^o 40' to it, like you might have 4 foot 5 inch and need to add 8 inches and I bet it's extremely rare anyone will need to convert a number like 345 arcminutes to degrees. A equilateral triangle has the same angles, irrespective of its size. Using a different base than 10 doesn't cause the same issues as it does for linear measurements.

I'm sure the educated people in the UK already knew of the superiority of the SI system. It just took a long time for the government to make it standard.

The American people understand the advantages of metric. They already made it standard and have no plan/desire to deprecate/eradicate their other standard of measure. They like both.

The metric system essentially has few disadvantages over imperial, which has many. Using metric is only an issue if you've used imperial a lot in the past.