And now, a world map of countries that do not use the metric system.

[Occam Bandage]

[Bicoastal]

1. Hmm--us, Liberia, and Myanmar...

...that's some gooooood company right there.

[Schema Thing]

13. heh, I wondered if that was Liberia

[Renew Deal]

2. Good! I don't want to follow that communist counting system.

:silly:

[Captain Hilts]

3. Canada uses it in some way. England uses miles and pounds, ozs also. nt

[Andy Canuck]

19. Canada is all metric. We will post in pounds and ozs for those

who never made the brain shift. I still think in farenheit, but have cozied up to celsius.

[Captain Hilts]

89. Merchants prefer pounds and ozs. It's easier to say 'quarter pound' than xxx grams. nt

[Leftist Agitator]

91. What's so hard about saying 112 grams?

:shrug:

[Captain Hilts]

93. It's great for science, but as a measure, it's smaller than people want to deal with. We don't say.

our height in inches for the same reason.

[arcos]

110. Maybe American people...

That obviously is not the case in the rest of the world.

[KatyMan]

78. England's measuring is a mess

pounds, kilos, miles, centimeters, stone...it can be pretty confusing.

[Kerrytravelers]

103. I know a Stone is about 14 pounds.

Other than that, I am lost. I never really learned the Metric System in school. :blush::hide:

[Diclotican]

118. Kerrytravelers

Kerrytravelers

The Metric system is pretty easy to learn.. If the most of the world could learn it, then US would learn it, some down the road.. I doubt that the american school system is that stupid that they could not learn the metric system...

And for them who believe it to be an communist system. It is not an communist system, but in fact a living relic from the great French revolution where the whole of France was given ONE system to mesh everything.. Before that, every county, or even in many places have their own system to get goods and so on measured.. When the Revolution was riving everything out of place, the old system was replaced by one system, who still today are measured from the french capital Paris: Even that the Eternal City Rom still is the "center of the world":evilgrin: Well at least in the old world, when every road sometime would end up in Rom then...

Diclotican

Sorry my bad english, not my native language

[bdf]

80. And pints

We're still allowed to sell beer in pints and half-pints (note that UK pint is not the same as US pint).

But not milk. The bottle of milk in my fridge is sold in litres. Well, 1.136 litres. Which just happens to be 2 pints. But that's a pure coincidence, because milk is sold in metric quantities. Just not integer metric quantities.

[Diclotican]

117. MookieWilson

MookieWilson

UK have to use the Metric system too.. If they don't every one company who are in UK, could find them a little fine from the EU... So they do use the metric system. They just don't want to admit they use it... The metric system is legal in UK, as in most country in the world..

Diclotican

Sorry my bad english, not my native language

[Blue_Tires]

4. metric system is the tool of the DEVIL!

My car gets forty rods to the hogshead, and that's the way I likes it!

[TahitiNut]

17. It's DECAdent.

:shrug:

[meow2u3]

76. Decadent = 10 teeth?!

or does it mean you have 10 times more teeth then you should? :silly:

[isentropic]

31. But is that any good in furlongs per fortnight?

:silly:

[Canuckistanian]

62. Hey! That my joke

I copyrighted it back in MCMXCIX!

[Canuckistanian]

56. How fast does your car go in furlongs per fortnight? n/t

[Thothmes]

106. at what furlongs per fortnight

[a la izquierda]

115. Oh my gosh...are you my husband?

Seriously, you know that quote AND you're a mets fan. Tim, is that you???

Really, I know it's not, but hilarious..

[ContinentalOp]

5. Yes, this is by far the biggest problem facing our nation today.

That our road signs are in miles instead of km. :crazy:

[Occam Bandage]

7. Alright, DU. Please refrain from posting anywhere about anything but energy.

[TahitiNut]

24. Somebody's worried about their family joules.

:silly:

[B3Nut]

33. Watt are you talking about?

No need to get all Amped up! Just meditate and go "Ohm...."

:P

[Occam Bandage]

37. I think I'll go on a walk. Seems like a pretty Faraday for it.

[hootinholler]

45. Watt Hour you talking about?

I was going amping in my mobile ohm, but my voltswagon couldn't go that farad!

:P
:P

-Hoot

[Tesha]

36. Watt a second! That pun really erg'ed me! (NT)

[Occam Bandage]

38. Well, Weber you liked it or not, I'm afraid it started a trend.

[Tesha]

51. That pun went pretty far aField! But I gauss it might repel some folks.(NT)

[riverdeep]

104. And women's beach volleyball-wear.

Don't forget that. All else will be measured thusly.

[AndyTiedye]

22. It Makes it Harder to Sell Our Stuff Abroad

[meegbear]

6. And your point caller?

[Oregone]

8. Too early for this crap. Im still in the 3rd hour of my metric timed day.

:)

[mainegreen]

9. k

Countries that speak flemish:

[The2ndWheel]

10. Diversity isn't a bad thing

Wasteful, inefficient, and not maximizing production? Sure. Not a bad thing though.

[islandmkl]

11. on the other hand, my mayan calendar is working just fine....

for at least 4 more years, anyway...

[TexasObserver]

12. We like to stick our FOOT up the world's ass.

[ContinentalOp]

18. LOL

[TahitiNut]

21. Well, it is our back YARD.

:shrug:

[theboss]

14. USA! USA! USA!

They will have my yard stick when they take it from my cold dead hand.

[slackmaster]

15. That is my number 1 pet issue

Whenever someone asks me an open-ended question about the most serious threats to our nation, I put our failure to fully adopt and embrace the Metric System at the top of my list.

[TahitiNut]

16. If God hadn't wanted us to use the English system she wouldn't have given us 12 fingers.

:dunce:

[Bucky]

20. President Johnson signed a law ordering the US to convert to metric in '67. That's 1867.

Andrew Johnson ordered us to switch over 140 years ago. Something tells me we're gonna have a hard time getting with the program.

[romulusnr]

119. that's not quite right

the law made it legal to use the metric system in business and contracts, etc, but it didn't make it mandatory. Still we are less metric today then we were 20-30 years ago when metric promotion was at its high.

Oh and what President killed metrication and shut down the US Metric Board? Give ya one guess. Hint: he's the "greatest president" ever ever ever! (Not GWB)

[blondeatlast]

23. The B@L's may be moving to Germany later this year. My 6th grade son was worried about using metrics

I told him there was no "conversion" necessary, you simply use it. Since then, we've tried it at home. No problem whatsoever; if we need to use the US system, no problem either.

[tuckessee]

25. If they showed a map of countries that don't use geography books...

...it would show only the US of A.

I think knowing geography, history and foreign languages are much more important than a system of measurement that can be easily scientifically converted.

[Kali]

39. the stupidity of it is you DON'T NEED TO CONVERT

you just start using it. Converting and OH MY GOD, MATH is what freaks idiots out. You can't ease into it, you just set a date and change. The vast majority of people would adjust in three days.

[Greyhound]

46. Bingo! n/t

[jimshoes]

26. If it's good enough for Burma

then I'm OK with it. I like never knowing what size socket or wrench I'm going to need to remove a part on my car or some other appliance. And having to have 2 sets of tools instead of one.

[applegrove]

27. That is hillarious. LOL! Seriously we converted to metric in Canada

when I was about 9. I still use the old system for height and weight. Conversion isn't so traumatic. Things you use all the time like temperature and Kilometers you learn pretty quick. Others not so much. And everyone is in the same boat.

[snooper2]

28. Last time I checked I have metric and standard tools

As does every mechanic I've ever seen... :)

I'll still be remodeling my house in feet and inches though :rofl:

[dysfunctional press]

34. but do you have a metric adjustable crescent wrench...?

back in college, a girl on our floor was taking a stagecraft class where she needed a set of basic tools, and i took her shopping to get them. as we were going down the list, and got to the adjustable crescent wrench, i got her all freaked out by asking if it needed to be standard or metric.
and it's still a great way to test the kid who works in the tool dept at the home despot...

[TommyO]

40. This is deliciously evil!

I'll have to try it, I'm stopping at the Despot tonight for something completely unrelated.

[snooper2]

41. good one...

like asking for a metric level :rofl:

[Tesha]

52. Actually, such things *DO* exist.

Most levels are a certain number of "local units"
long (in America, say, 2 or 3 feet) so a metric
level would be a metre or a useful fraction thereof.

Tesha

[snooper2]

75. I was thinking about that as I posted...

my 4 foot level hanging on the wall :rofl:

I've got smaller ones that don't have any measurements though... :)

I should have said a metric framing hammer- better :evilgrin:

[Tesha]

81. There ya go! (NT)

[dysfunctional press]

97. well..my estwings are 20, and 28 oz. framing hammers (if you consider 20oz. to be a hammer, that is)

20oz. = 566.990 grams and 28oz. = 793.786 grams...
i imagine they'll have to start selling 600gram and 800gram models...:shrug:
but i'd sure hate to have to lug a 1000gram hammer around on my belt all day.

[dysfunctional press]

29. we'll convert when walmart decides it's time to do so.

metric clocks are probably going to be the hardest to adapt to for me...

[VWolf]

43. LOL Reminds me of

Dan Akroyd in that SNL skit - The Metric Alphabet. What a hoot.

A B C D EF GHI J K LMNO and PQRSTUVWXYZ

[izquierdista]

30. The conversion will happen

When the Chinese decide that it's too much bother to keep churning out goods in English units and decide to drop that sideline as unprofitable, that's when the U.S. will have to change -- because they won't be able to make any of that stuff on their own.

[Evoman]

32. Imperial systems of measurement make no sense to me.

The only ones I semi-understand is feet and pounds (and only when it's in relation to height and weight, not when it's used for things smaller or larger than a human body).

But a quart? What the fuck is a quart? Metric is the shiznit.

[Recursion]

58. Have you ever cooked off of a metric recipe?

The Imperial system uses convenient units that are relevant to everyday practices like cooking. Our brains halve and quarter a lot more easily than they divide things into tenths.

What is a quart? 4 chugs of liquid -- four short drinks or two tall ones.

Imperial lengths are outdated, sure: they're still based on distances relevant to walking or plowing. But Imperial volume measurements (and even weight measurements) are imminently more practical, which is why even in countries that use the metric system officially, the Imperial (or whatever other previous system was used) is very stubborn in the kitchen.

[Evoman]

59. I love metric recipes....but I'm a scientist, so I think in mLs and L.

[Romulox]

83. Metric distance/length measurements are poorly scaled to the human environment...

I'm 1.78 meters tall?

I'm 178 cms tall?

:shrug:

[Captain Hilts]

90. Grams don't work well in the real world either. nt

[Leftist Agitator]

92. "Our brains halve and quarter a lot more easily than they divide things into tenths."

Correction: YOUR brain halves and quarters a lot more easily than it divides things into tenths.

[Recursion]

111. No. Try not to be stupid.

Let's at least try not to be idiots here. 1/2 is empirically and unarguably easier to eyeball than 3 / 10ths. Seriously, are you even bothering to argue that?

[Leftist Agitator]

113. Yes, I am "even bothering to argue that".

10% of a quantity is quite simple. Move a decimal place to the left. For multiples of 10%, multiply by the appropriate factor.

Christ on a cracker, you've got to have a learning disability if you think that computing "halves and quarters" is simpler than computing multiples of 0.1...

[petronius]

63. A quart is a child-size soda at McDonalds

:)

[Evoman]

67. Shit...now I want McDonalds. Goddamn it.

[dysfunctional press]

100. a quart is two pints or 16 ounces or 1/4 of a gallon...what the fuck is a litre? liter?

:shrug:

if you tell me that a liter is 1.05668 quarts, that at least gives me an idea as to how much we're talking about.

[ManiacJoe]

108. Liter = quart plus spillage.

:evilgrin:

[bikebloke]

35. Jimmy Carter tried to make the change.

Gas stations had started converting to litres. Then Bonzo came into power and it was scrapped.

I can think in both metric and imperial. Once some stranger asked directions and I told him the distance in metric. He got huffy and asked where I went to school. I retorted, why didn't he go to school?

[yardwork]

53. It wasn't scrapped. Raygun announced that we had converted. And that was that.

We converted to metric back in Reagan's first term. He said so! The U.S. uses the metric system so stop talking about it.

What.

[bobbert]

42. I like the idea of the fahrenheit scale. 0 is really cold and 100 is really hot

There are a lot more increments so it's very useful (until you calculate calories, etc.). Other than that, I'll take liters, grams, and meters.

[Evoman]

70. I hate fahrenheit....of all the imperial measurements, it's the one I find worst.

It doesn't help that the conversion is so fucking hard to remember...was it 5/9 or 9/5...fuck it, I'm changing the channel to a sane canadian station.

[SheilaT]

44. My older son,

a former physics major and all-around science geek, constantly gives me measurements in metric. I have to politely ask him to translate for me, since I really only know our strange system well.

[KG]

47. hey! we're america dammit! fuck da world!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

48. I had to learn it when I lived in Japan

It's not that hard.

A meter is a little more than a yard

A kilogram is a little more than 2 pounds. If you want a pound of something at the deli, ask for 500 grams

A kilometer is 5/8 of a mile

A liter is a little more than a quart

0°C is 32°F
10°C is 50°F
20°C is 68°F
30°C is 86°F
40°C is 104°F

That's all there is to it.

My fellow Americans are such stubborn wusses.

[Cheap_Trick]

49. McDonald's will be hardest hit by a conversion to the metric system

Quarter Pounder to Royale With Cheese and all that.......

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

50. And I Hope We Never Do.

The metric system's just silly.

Long live the foot!

[CrazyDude]

54. So? This isn't the death penalty we're talking about here

On a side note, it's interesting how a lot of the pro-life countries are anti-death penalty (Mexico etc.) and a lot of the pro-choice countries are pro-death penalty (United States).

[PVnRT]

55. You'll get my BTUs and SCFM when you pry them out of my cold, dead hands

[Ezlivin]

57. We use the US Metric System

Instead of switching units of measurement, we simply renamed what we've used all along.

The United States: Governance by PR.

[unblock]

60. i know how to get us to switch -- just call our system by its proper name: "avoirdupois"

call it a french system and watch the wingnuts' heads expode.

[JVS]

61. UK uses miles for the distances and speeds

[enid602]

64. billion

I think the US is the only country where one billion = one thousand millions. In Latin America, for example one thousand millions is un mil millon (a thousand millions), not one billion. Here (I'm living in BsAs for six months), one billion equals one MILLION millions.

[Evoman]

68. Canada is like that too.

[DS1]

65. Oh come on. England was small enough to make the switch easily, the

rest just didn't have anything worth measuring.



:hide:

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

66. A map of the non-metric militaries would be all grey.

"The metric system: Our troops use it so we won't have to."

[Thothmes]

107. Bet our Navy still mearsure distance

in Nautical miles ( 2,000 yards) and depth in fathoms (6 ft.)

[earth mom]

69. I think people should be more worried about the US changing it's currency to the Amero

and becoming one country-the North American Union-with Mexico and Canada.

We are so screwed if this happens people. :yoiks:

[tridim]

71. Anyone know why the UK still uses "stone" as a measure of weight?

[Kipper58]

94. This COULD be a reason -

A woman in the UK who weighs one-hundred-and-five-pounds can tell everyone she knows that she only weighs seven-and-a-half stones.

now doesn't that sound better !!:-) :-) :-)

[tridim]

96. Yea, but she'd also weigh only 47 kilos.

I didn't really hear the term stone until I started watching BBC on Dish. It just seems like a completely arbitrary unit of measure. Even more arbitrary than pounds.

[Marr]

72. I bet we could sell it if we told people they can drive 105 km/hour if they convert.

[romulusnr]

122. sell it in summer when we can tell them it's only 30 out (n/t)

[iamthebandfanman]

73. i like our system

is there a valid reason other than conformity to changing to metric?

all throughout my schooling we were told we had to learn the metric system because we were going to switch... but thats never happened... probably for the best too.

[indepat]

74. Almost the whole world is out of step with us on the use of the metric and Cuban

issue. Why can't the rest of the world get it? :P

[Xithras]

77. We're metric where it matters.

Science and research is all metric now, and has been for years. Most U.S. manufacturing has been going to metric since the early 90's (international trade requires it, so that American parts and foreign parts will work together). Heck, even my brothers pot dealer sells in grams.

Most of the imperial system in use today is in the consumer area where it doesn't really matter all that much. Who cares if my speedometer is labelled in MPH and my car gets lots of MPG's? Why does it matter if I measure the flour for my cookie recipe in ounces? It really shouldn't...for ANYBODY.

[scarletwoman]

102. Interesting that you mention pot dealing.

Way back when I was a small time pot seller, we only had metric scales (the nice three beam kind), so we always had to convert from grams to ounces in order to properly package our product.

That's right, kids. Being a pot dealer is EDUCATIONAL! Don't ever let them tell you anything different.

:smoke:
sw

[progressoid]

79. It'll happen eventually.

We have been slowly making the conversion (very slowly). But as we weaken as a nation, we will succumb to the necessity of being compatible with the rest of the world rather than be left behind.

[Bonobo]

82. That map exaggerates the size of the US...

and reduces the size of Asia.

[JBoy]

84. I like metric. My penis is longer in centimeters than in inches.

[onethatcares]

85. its' really hard to lern,

it's got those 10 things in it and that makes it cornfusing as all git out. If god wanted us to use the metric system, he'da never given us the dewey decimal system.:silly:

[ileus]

86. 38/64ths 9/16ths WTF....Maybe O can change this could help GM&Ford

[yellowcanine]

87. Actually we do use the metric system in many areas. I don't think it is really that big of a deal.

[Alexander]

88. One of those countries, Liberia, was created by the United States.

Myanmar is a repressive military dictatorship.

Lovely.

[wvbygod]

95. How about a map of those capable of using both?

You know...multi lingual as is so desired.

[ColbertWatcher]

98. I think it would be the opposite of the one in the OP. n/t

[librechik]

99. what is this metric system you speak of?

Can't hear you back in the 16th century where I still live in the Spanish Colonies with McCain.

[ddeclue]

101. The Metric System - Blame the French!

:P

Doug D.

[riverdeep]

105. When our economy goes into meltdown, as it will,

we'll be using the metric system. The only reason we don't is because of our 'superpower' status. When we're a laughing stock thanks to the unimpeachable Bush-Cheney, we won't have the leverage to dictate anything.

[immoderate]

109. The Metric Conversion Act of 1975... (we're a bit behind.)

http://lamar.colostate.edu/~hillger/laws/metric-conv.html

The Metric Conversion Act of 1975 (later amended by the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988, the Savings in Construction Act of 1996, and the Department of Energy High-End Computing Revitalization Act of 2004) designated the metric system as the preferred system of weights and measures for US trade and commerce, and directed federal agencies to convert to the metric system, to the extent feasible, including the use of metric in construction of federal facilities.

It also created the United States Metric Board to assist in the conversion, although the Board no longer exists.

--IMM

[opihimoimoi]

112. Rejection is mostly due to SPORTS...whad ya gonna do with all those RECORDS??

:flummoxed:

[zorahopkins]

114. I Just Bought A Liter of Soda.

I just bought a liter of soda.

And I live in the United States.

(And most of my prescriptions are in grams, or portions of grams!!)

What gives?

Am I not living in the USA??

[romulusnr]

121. satanic commie foreign interests have taken control of our meds and soda!!! n/t

[spin]

116. Metric mishap caused loss of NASA orbiter...

NASA lost a $125 million Mars orbiter because a Lockheed Martin engineering team used English units of measurement while the agency's team used the more conventional metric system for a key spacecraft operation, according to a review finding released Thursday.

The units mismatch prevented navigation information from transferring between the Mars Climate Orbiter spacecraft team in at Lockheed Martin in Denver and the flight team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Lockheed Martin helped build, develop and operate the spacecraft for NASA. Its engineers provided navigation commands for Climate Orbiter's thrusters in English units although NASA has been using the metric system predominantly since at least 1990.
http://www.cnn.com/TECH/space/9909/30/mars.metric.02/

When I went to school in the sixties we were told that the United States would be on the metric system in ten years. Resistance to change is a human weakness.

[Nikki Stone1]

120. Another one of you metric system activists!

:D