Demise of imperial units continues

[BrilloPad]

So, let me get this straight. Some people still use imperial units for measuring distance!? Holy ******* tulip!

It is illegal for road signs to be anything other than imperial.

[alluvial]

Imperial has been dieing out for a long time, it's not precise enough for the modern world. The construction industry has used metric for decades, my uncle is in his late 70s and can't remember the last time he measured imperial. Even the bloomin US military use metric.

Precision has nothing to do with the system of measurement. I have a number of very old Rabone steel and boxwood imperial rulers and I'd bet that they are far more precise than any of the tulip metric rules you can buy in B&Q.

Quite frankly I can't understand this obsession with making us conform to a single system of measurement. The current method of stating horse racing distances is perfectly understandable to the average British punter and changing to metric is just going to confuse everybody for a long time.

The imperial system of weights and measures has a large variety of different scales and these are used in the context that they are most suited and to avoid having to state ridiculous numbers to convey the measurement. It is easier to state 5 furlongs than 1005 metres or 1100 yards. In my view we should be able to make our own choices as to what system of measurement we use and these pratts that are continually trying to impose an alternative on our everyday lives should feck off.

[SueEllen]

these pratts that are continually trying to impose an alternative on our everyday lives should feck off.

Part of the reason the "pratts" are imposing it (though I don't see why it needs to be imposed in horse racing) is so that they can check easily if the man in the street is being ripped off.

There are trading standards units around the country who go around checking things like whether the drinks measures in a pub are correct and shopkeepers scales. Much easier and quicker to do this if the scale used is uniform.

[TimberWolf]

Not overly bothered for quaint historic uses where you don't need to do any arithmetic with them or compare them to anything or do anything with them at all. If people can understand furlongs and all the other higgledy piggledy base-random units, they are master arithmeticians and should have no trouble understanding metric. I blame the Romans, whose arithmetic was tulip verging on impossible too. And what's worse, the same unit has different sizes across the world.

[alluvial]

Part of the reason the "pratts" are imposing it (though I don't see why it needs to be imposed in horse racing) is so that they can check easily if the man in the street is being ripped off.

There are trading standards units around the country who go around checking things like whether the drinks measures in a pub are correct and shopkeepers scales. Much easier and quicker to do this if the scale used is uniform.

I'm not saying that we should have a mix of measures for the same thing, only that where everyone uses a common measure, then leave it alone. I want to be able to buy a pint of bitter in the pub and if this was changed to some fraction of a litre, then it wouldn't benefit anyone.

[VectraMan]

I want to be able to buy a pint of bitter in the pub and if this was changed to some fraction of a litre, then it wouldn't benefit anyone.

TBH I buy "a beer", "a guinness" or whatever I'm in the mood for. If they gave me a roughly equivalent metric measure I doubt I'd notice the difference.

I think the Germans still have the "Pfund" for weight, which roughly translates to "pound", although it actually means 0.5Kg, and not whatever our ridiuclously olde fashioned imperial unit means.

[SueEllen]

UK pint = 0.5682 of a litre

To be honest I don't really notice if I'm drinking a pint or half a litre as lots of European countries sell "large beers" depending on the beer.

[xoggoth]

What Alluvial said. If people understand something and there is no international dimension, ie we are not trying to sell it to the Chinese, why change it?

[Old Greg]

What Alluvial said. If people understand something and there is no international dimension, ie we are not trying to sell it to the Chinese, why change it?

Butt out of it.

[Spacecadet]

Here's one pair of Imperial Units I hope aren't going anywhere soon

http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/stormtrooper%20babe.jpg