Why the heck does America still use outdated measurement and date units?

[bunnspecial]

Okay, I'm going to have to take back what I said about Rowling being pro Imperial. Here's the measurement "from the horse's mouth" so to speak.

https://www.pottermore.com/writing-by-jk-rowling/measurements

For anyone who doesn't read:

1. She used the imperial system in the books because she thought it was more fitting to the whimsical and resistant to change world she was creating

2. She is not anti-metric

3. She joined a pro-Imperial group primarily to annoy her sister

 

[Scepticalscribe]

Okay, I'm going to have to take back what I said about Rowling being pro Imperial. Here's the measurement "from the horse's mouth" so to speak.

https://www.pottermore.com/writing-by-jk-rowling/measurements

For anyone who doesn't read:

1. She used the imperial system in the books because she thought it was more fitting to the whimsical and resistant to change world she was creating

2. She is not anti-metric

3. She joined a pro-Imperial group primarily to annoy her sister

Thanks for tracking this down - I hadn't known it. Fair comment - Rowling has lived abroad, and has excellent French, and is pretty internationalist in outlook.

That piece is very funny, though.

Well, I read the books when they came out and my sense always was that she was writing a little tongue in cheek, almost as a subtle send up, which I had assumed - without giving it much thought. A marked preference for the quirky, yes, that makes sense, as being quite compatible with the world she created.

 

[grahamperrin]

I was half-joking about tradition and my twopenneth … that's seriously outdated currency but traditional language from some people of my age in the UK.

 

[samiwas]

You know that a few trillion other people in other countries already managed this without too much problem.

A few trillion, huh?

 

[thegrants82]

Okay guys, this is probably my angry 1 AM self again posting here, but this is something that has been bothering me for a few weeks now. I am posting it here because I know this is a website primarily of American people, and I don't know who else to rant this about.


Okay, first off, temperature. We all know what the three useful temperature measurements are. Only one is used in daily use, it's Celsius, and across the entire world. It is the most logical of the three, 0° is water's freezing point, 100° is its boiling point, every semi-educated person knows that. Only THREE countries use Fahrenheit exclusively, and surprise surprise, the United States is one of them. Why? Why is that necessary? Why use a system that is absolutely outdated, makes no sense whatsoever (water freezes at 32° and melts at 212°? yeah, totally makes sense), that is used by basically no one else? Even, excuse me for this term, stubborn countries like the United Kingdom now use Celsius exclusively and primarily. Even Canada, and its influence of the country did not force it to keep Fahrenheit. It annoys me because every time someone says "it's 60° outside!" I have to google and convert it because that means nothing for me, and I don't communicate enough with Americans to bother learning it. I could get away with it if it was something that was used interchangeably in multiple countries, but it isn't, it's outdated.

Second, measurement units. On one hand, you have the most logical system on the planet, the metric system. Simple, each unit correlates with each other, and there are basic prefixes which simply divide or multiply the numbers by multiples of 10. And I will be blunt here, the imperial units are more intuitive and are still somewhat logical. However, once you want to do anything slightly more complex, it becomes annoying. You can't do anything with a system like that. You have to learn the massive amount of words and how each of them correspond with each other. Imagine instead of having to use Kilobytes, Megabytes, Gigabytes, Terabytes, you would instead use Floppies, Discs, Drives, and Servers. It seems like the logical option, but they do not work together well at all and you gotta remember all of that crap. Once again, only the United States along with two other small countries exclusively use this system. In fact, when I thought that the United Kingdom was responsible for the same thing, it turns out it's technically the main measurement system of today (even though many people still use the other one), so I've actually gotta give them credit for having the guts to defy a traditional system. Every commonwealth country has adopted the SI, even if some like Canada still offer it occasionally. Seriously, why do this? Sure, I can deal with that, it's not like it's stupid or anything, but NOT when it's officially only used in a SINGLE GODDAMN COUNTRY (I'm excluding minor countries here because they are usually very small and have very little influence on the rest of the world).

Finally, this one pisses me off so much I just want to die. The date system. The entire world uses one or the other, either a DD/MM/YYYY system (common in European countries), either a YYYY/MM/DD system (common in East-Asian countries and some other places). Both are perfectly fine, as they represent a proper level of importance. What is NOT fine is when a single country just comes to troll everybody and bring a MM/DD/YYYY system, which completely messes up the order of the dates. The month, then a small part of the month, and then the year which the month takes place in? WHAT? How does that make any sense? WHY IS THAT NECESSARY? WHY THE ILLOGICALITY? I can bear with a January 1st, 2016 date system because it is closer to being a feature of the language, but not when it's a purely written form! At least use YYYY/MM/DD if you want to keep the M/D part! Seriously!


Okay, I understand that this was a bit blunt. But I can't accept that. I can't accept a country where there are people so lazy to adopt systems that are, by far, much more convenient than whatever is present, especially considering we are in 2016 and no improvement has been made to this date. And not to mention I'm sure there will be some idiots defending this system saying that "we are not sheeple to follow other people like that!". Well, uh, then you're sheeple to your own ****ing community. Any thoughts? Sure, you may call be brainwashed if that's what you believe, but I'd just like to point out that even though I grew up in a 24h system and I completely switched to 12h. And now I'm (partially) back at 24h. During this whole time, I barely spent any time outside. How exactly can you prove this against me if that's your intent? Anyway, any reasonable and non-biased explanations and/or defenses? Thank you.

Because we have the best weapons and the most money.

 

[AustinIllini]

A few trillion, huh?

About 7 trillion. 1000 for every person on earth

 

[samiwas]

About 7 trillion. 1000 for every person on earth

Oh, wait...we're talking about metric population, right?

 

[Scepticalscribe]

Tradition.

That's my twopenneth. Ha. Ha.

I was half-joking about tradition and my twopenneth … that's seriously outdated currency but traditional language from some people of my age in the UK.

Ah, Twopennyworth, or tuppence worth, well, yes, it is seriously outdated currency (and language) but, also, yes, I can remember that vocabulary or traditional language being used as well.

The half crown? As a very small kid, if, by happy chance, you were given one of those - now, that was serious money.

However, @grahamperrin, I doubt that either yourself - or myself - can lay claim to remembering the groat.

I have seen what was called a sovereign, and - for that matter - a guinea.
[doublepost=1463994906][/doublepost]However, I will add an interesting observation to this discussion.

While I have been somewhat struck by the rather defensive (and occasionally arrogant) tone taken by some of our Transatlantic Cousins on this topic, I have also been struck by their lack of historical awareness.

You bristle and bridle at the thought of metric measurements - but, once upon time you led the bloody world in the implementation of such things.

The clarity and convenience of your currency, - devised in Revolutionary times - in turn, inspired France (after the Revolution, when everything from politics, to currency, to the calendar underwent sweeping reforms) to change the way it measured such things, and that, in turn, served to influence much of Europe over the following two centuries.

Once upon a distant time, you led the way - and - not just in politics - but also in devising a sensible currency that everyone could use. And now, you baulk at adding the degree of consistency across your entire system of measurement.

Now, I am - or have been - a historian, and I love quirky, antique things. Besides, as mentioned earlier, I am equally conversant with both the imperial and metric systems and can convert effortlessly in my head.

However, the mad way of ordering time baffles me. Indeed, every time I see a date stamp form the US I do a double take, and have to work it out.

 

[cube]

It's true, the US date format is the stupidest thing, and it is especially annoying when it is imposed on international users.

 

[JeffyTheQuik]

Prior to about 1996, all US Aviation Weather was in empirical units.
For some odd reason, we went to the French system of Metars and TAFs (and airspace reclassification), even though North America has my flying than the rest of the world combined.
The younger guys get confused when I ask for a sequence report and I have to correct my self and ask for a Metar.

I think the French got all haughty when the part were named with French words, like fuselage, nacelle, and empennage. I guess I'm with the younger guys, as I'm finishing up ground school, and we are learning about decoding METAR, TAF, wondering what happened to Class F airspace, and looking forward to demonstrating to the FAA how an E6B works, before we can get out our iPads and just use that.

For me, I'm learning the manual E6B, just because I like that kind of thing. It's better to know how to add manually than to rely on a calculator.
[doublepost=1464011598][/doublepost]

It's true, the US date format is the stupidest thing, and it is especially annoying when it is imposed on international users.

You know, I'll give you that it's confusing, but only for the first 12 days of the month. However, when I get in these discussions, it usually bends towards the quirks of the English (or in my case, the American) language, when I say, after about 3-4 minutes of someone bashing the language for the difficulty in reading, spelling (to lead is good, but to eat lead is bad, and why don't rough and bough rhyme?), and pronunciation, I tell them, "English is the easiest language in the world to learn. I've been speaking it since I was a child."

The same is for the dates, measurement systems, and other things. What you grew up with is easy. Changing it willingly, for no perceived benefit, makes little sense to self impose. Something intangible, or hard to show the benefit of, "making it easier for people from foreign lands to visit." may be true, but please show me the trillions of dollars... err... euros, yen, drachmas, or shillings that are due to the response to
"Honey, let's go to America, and see how they Yanks do things over there!" is
"Dear, let's not. They use miles, Fahrenheit, and gallons, so everything will take longer to get to, because we're thinking in kilometers, Celsius (or is it Centigrade?), and liters, and that's just too much to think about. Let's tell the kids we'll go to Libya, because we don't have to deal with that crazy American measuring stuff there."

 

[cube]

It created an ambiguity, that's why it was dumb to start using an illogical format.

 

[maflynn]

Wow, 9 pages of discussion over something as trivial as a time format (and the metric system thrown in as well).

Its not like any of this is going to change, yet we see people lining up on both sides of the argument and smugly defend their position as superior.

For me, I don't care, I can easily tell what time it is, when my wife tells me to pick her up at 6:00 (even if she doesn't state pm). Likewise, I can easily use 18:00.

To me, this is one of those let's not make a mountain out of a mole hill issue, or as they say now - First world issues

 

[cube]

Wow, 9 pages of discussion over something as trivial as a time format (and the metric system thrown in as well).

Its not like any of this is going to change, yet we see people lining up on both sides of the argument and smugly defend their position as superior.

For me, I don't care, I can easily tell what time it is, when my wife tells me to pick her up at 6:00 (even if she doesn't state pm). Likewise, I can easily use 18:00.

To me, this is one of those let's not make a mountain out of a mole hill issue, or as they say now - First world issues

Obviously, you're not a programmer.

 

[maflynn]

Obviously, you're not a programmer.

Obviously you're wrong

 

[cube]

Obviously you're wrong

Then you live in your application bubble.

 

[maflynn]

Then you live in your application bubble.

No, as you missed my point.

A time format is not really a huge issue. If you want to use the 24 hour format, use it. If you want the am/pm format use it. Why get worked up over other people's preference. You hate the am/pm format that's your pejorative, but that doesn't mean I have to use the 24 hour format in everything i do. Sure, in work situations we use the 24 hour format, and that's fine.

Think what you will of my opinion, it matters not to me. I found it rather odd and humorous to the extent that people here discussed this issue. I'll move on from this thread now, and let you folks continue to debate it

 

[cube]

No, as you missed my point.

A time format is not really a huge issue. If you want to use the 24 hour format, use it. If you want the am/pm format use it. Why get worked up over other people's preference. You hate the am/pm format that's your pejorative, but that doesn't mean I have to use the 24 hour format in everything i do. Sure, in work situations we use the 24 hour format, and that's fine.

Think what you will of my opinion, it matters not to me. I found it rather odd and humorous to the extent that people here discussed this issue. I'll move on from this thread now, and let you folks continue to debate it

You ridiculized the WHOLE discussion.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Re the ordering and writing of dates, I think that there is a profound difference of opinion on that matter, on both sides of the Pond, and I doubt that either will change anytime soon.

Well it's not that easy. You would bump into the federal system of legislation, with each state legislature having to adapt their codes etc, and each and every entity (municipalities, counties, parishes etc.) having to adjust the according laws and regulations.
Plus each independent school district would have to change its own regulations.
It's doable, but not an easy thing to do in the US.

 

[cube]

Changing the date format now could bring more problems and not really solve anything.

But the imperial system should go away were it is safe, and not the internationally accepted convention.

The transition should be well thought out. NASA crashed a probe on Mars when mixing both systems, and Airbus had a massive A380 project rework, delay and cost overrun because it was using 2 different CAD software versions.

 

[JeffyTheQuik]

It created an ambiguity, that's why it was dumb to start using an illogical format.

Well demonstrated!
(meaning, without the quote you're referring to, the ambiguity abounds!)

 

[cube]

Airbus had a massive A380 project rework, delay and cost overrun because it was using 2 different CAD software versions.

A380: 100,000 cables. 530km. Routing calculation problem meant cables were too short and had to be ripped out, redesigned, and replaced.

I don't know how many planes they had to redo.

 

[JeffyTheQuik]

No, as you missed my point.

A time format is not really a huge issue. If you want to use the 24 hour format, use it. If you want the am/pm format use it. Why get worked up over other people's preference. You hate the am/pm format that's your pejorative, but that doesn't mean I have to use the 24 hour format in everything i do. Sure, in work situations we use the 24 hour format, and that's fine.

Think what you will of my opinion, it matters not to me. I found it rather odd and humorous to the extent that people here discussed this issue. I'll move on from this thread now, and let you folks continue to debate it

This was the water faucet point I was making. People come over and yell at you because you have hot on the right, and cold on the left, and it bothers them so much when they come over. Hey, if it works for you, it works for you.

I think we should move on to other much more important topics, like which side of the road is the proper side to drive on, and whine until they agree with you.
[doublepost=1464021277][/doublepost]

A380: 100,000 cables. 530km. Routing calculation problem meant cables were too short and had to be ripped out, redesigned, and replaced.

Is there a proper Root Cause Analysis that said that the root cause was 2 CAD systems, or was it a contributing cause? I know the news likes to attribute the root cause to English/Metric conversion, but there can be other deeper causes, like people not communicating the measurement system they were using. This is more of a curiosity point than a challenge to what you're stating. Often, the news latches on to one thing, and holds on to it like a rabid snake with lockjaw. (yes, I know about snakes, rabies, and lockjaw...)

5 Why's, fishbone charts, and all that...

 

[cube]

I remember reading the French and German teams were not using the same CAD software. They fixed this, and also many people moved to integrate them better.

Europe is metric, I meant something similar could happen if mixing systems.

NASA became fully metric after their problem.

With more and more international collaboration, it is important to be consistent, hence abandoning imperial.

 

[bunnspecial]

The same is for the dates, measurement systems, and other things. What you grew up with is easy. Changing it willingly, for no perceived benefit, makes little sense to self impose. Something intangible, or hard to show the benefit of, "making it easier for people from foreign lands to visit." may be true, but please show me the trillions of dollars... err... euros, yen, drachmas, or shillings that are due to the response to

Personally, I don't want to go to England-they drive on the wrong side of the road!

A lot of these things that we're disagreeing about-like the date conventions-are different in different places simply because they evolved concurrently and were somewhat of an arbitrary(or at least a reason related to speaking conventions) that caused them to arise the way they did.

And, with my reference to driving, I will mention the fact that owning an older British car has forced me to learn a totally new and unfamiliar vocabulary that is necessary to know when reading things like service manuals. Most people know the common ones like boot, bonnet, and tyre, but that's really only scratching the surface. On my car, I've taken to referring to the cover over the engine compartment as the "bonnet" simply to reduce ambiguity because my car also has what the British refer to as a "hood"(convertible top). That aside, I was lost when I first started digging in, as I had no idea what "tickover" referred to or what the heck the "bulk head" and "balk rings" were. Other terms were obvious by context-such as when I was reading about the mounting of "wing mirrors", but some I really had no idea what they meant. As my first entry into some older automobile technologies, I also initially learned terms like "contact breaker" that left the parts guys behind the counter scratching their heads until I realized that they'd know exactly what I was talking about if I asked for "ignition points" or even just the generic "points." I'm still not completely fluent in British car speak, but like I said will often use it when talking about my British especially when there is a chance for ambiguity to be present. Of course, I would never drive with the(American) hood up, but have been known to drive with the(British) hood up

 

[cube]

Personally, I don't want to go to England-they drive on the wrong side of the road!

You have to be very careful when crossing the street and driving. Murphy's Law.