this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2023
2855 points (97.0% liked)
Strange Planet by Nathan W. Pyle
7088 readers
1 users here now
A community dedicated to Strange Planet comics by Nathan W. Pyle.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I live in a country that's gradually moved to metric over the last 30 years. The only thing we use imperial for now is height and pints in the pub. Older folks still use it for body weight.
Speed limits were less of an issue than you might think as they convert pretty closely - 30mph is very close to 50kph etc.
I love that a litre of water weighs a kilo and takes up 100 cubic centimetres.
There's a really good reason for this, the first being that there is no metric equivalent of a pint because if there was it would be 500ml and an imperial pint is 570ml, nobody wants less beer in their pint. Poor Americans have a 475ml pint.
The height one (and any other remnants of imperial numeracy) is largely due to American cultural media exports and it's easier for non Americans to convert to American imperial units due to exposure to both, to engage in effective communication.