"Florida Man" is still at it

[Free]

I thought FL Oz was a failed attempt at setting Dorothy stories in different states.

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

Not really Florida Man but I thought it belongs here

I don't know - the original person was either a Fl man or a Fl woman, so.....

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

Not really Florida Man but I thought it belongs here

Yet another reason why we really need to switch to metric!

 

[Clara D.]

Yet another reason why we really need to switch to metric!

And I thought Fl Oz referred to a more redneck, bug, and gator-infested version of the Emerald City.

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

Yet another reason why we really need to switch to metric!

Another reason being that metric is legit easier to work with, as I learned when I tried imperial measurements in Blender.

 

[Arkady Arkright]

Another reason being that metric is legit easier to work with, as I learned when I tried imperial measurements in Blender.

Is that a measurement problem, or a Blender problem ?

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

Is that a measurement problem, or a Blender problem ?

Measurement - its a lot easier to work in base 10 than it is to try and work in inches, feet and yards. Of course I've been half thinking in metric since '04, so....

 

[WolfEyes]

Metric is fine for things like Blender and SL but when it comes to how far I have traveled on the face of the planet, it's gotta be in miles or I'll arrive days early. Weeks even.

What I'm saying is I do ok with metric for some things, but there will always be a few things that I just can't get my brain to flip over to.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Measurement - its a lot easier to work in base 10 than it is to try and work in inches, feet and yards. Of course I've been half thinking in metric since '04, so....

I'm all over the place... I learned to think of distances in miles, and people's heights in feet. So if I hear KM or meters there, I have to convert for it to make sense to me. ...BUT, I actually learned some things in metric. All my knowledge of metal heat treatments or thermodynamics are in metric, so it makes more sense for me to think of it that way. For example, I know off the top of my head you might anneal a low alloy steel at 780 C. I'd have to look up what that is in F... Then I of course think of SL sky boxes in terms of meters...

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

I could stare at that for hours and go, "how tf did they do that?"

 

[Arkady Arkright]

Measurement - its a lot easier to work in base 10 than it is to try and work in inches, feet and yards. Of course I've been half thinking in metric since '04, so....

I grew up with the 'old' measurement system. I still can't visualise a metre or a centimetre as well as I can an inch or a yard (same with miles/kilometres).

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

I'm much better with grams than ounces because a cubic centimeter of water is easy.

 

[Ashiri]

I can handle inches (~25 mm), feet (~30 cm), yards(~0.9 m), and pints (of beer), but all other Imperial measurements are foreign to me now.

 

[WolfEyes]

I could stare at that for hours and go, "how tf did they do that?"

They didn't do anything. Your mind sees a mirror and nothing you do will change your mind. It's an optical illusion.

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

I grew up with the 'old' measurement system. I still can't visualise a metre or a centimetre as well as I can an inch or a yard (same with miles/kilometres).

So did I. But I've been using base ten for a good bit now - its the main system used for money in most TTRPGs I play, SL, and really, its easier math.

I mean, I'll be 55 this year and grew up in the US - to the best of my knowledge, they never changed to metric, even after teasing it in the 70s/80s.

 

[WolfEyes]

So did I. But I've been using base ten for a good bit now - its the main system used for money in most TTRPGs I play, SL, and really, its easier math.

I mean, I'll be 55 this year and grew up in the US - to the best of my knowledge, they never changed to metric, even after teasing it in the 70s/80s.

The US uses both and has since December 23, 1975, when Ford signed the Metric Conversion Act into effect. Main reasons why metric never really caught on are time and money.

Whenever the discussion of switching unit systems arose in Congress, the passage of a bill favoring the metric system was thwarted by big businesses and American citizens who didn’t want to go through the time-consuming and expensive hassle of changing the country’s entire infrastructure. Many also believed that the United States should keep its particular system, setting it apart from other countries and symbolizing its status as a leader rather than a follower.

In modern times, most have accepted a joint unit system—teaching children in school both the traditionally used IS system and the metric system that most of the rest of the world uses. This is why U.S. measuring sticks, or rulers, often contain both inches and centimeters. Unfortunately for metrics fans, widespread acceptance of joint use also means that there likely will be no official phasing out of the IS system anytime soon.

Why Doesn’t the U.S. Use the Metric System? | Britannica

The United States Constitution states, in Section 8 of Article I, that Congress shall have the power to “fix the standard of weights and measures.

www.britannica.com

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

The US uses both and has since December 23, 1975, when Ford signed the Metric Conversion Act into effect. Main reasons why metric never really caught on are time and money.

Why Doesn’t the U.S. Use the Metric System? | Britannica

The United States Constitution states, in Section 8 of Article I, that Congress shall have the power to “fix the standard of weights and measures.

www.britannica.com

Yes, I know - I was in 3rd grade then. First year in a parochial, stateside school, too. But there is a difference between using both and switching to. And while we were -sorta- taught metric, we were mostly just taught imperial.

 

[Casey Pelous]

There's also the not inconsiderable circumstance that we owned and continue to own unimaginably vast quantities of stuff held together with 3/4" bolts and there's no precise metric equivalent for the bolt, the nut, or the wrench. Multiply that by about 10,000,000,000 for every bolt, nut, screw, washer, cleavis pin*, etc. and all the machines that make those things and you can see it takes more than a little legislative handwaving to make metric happen in the US.

* I have no idea what a cleavis pin is, but I feel like some sort of very knowledgeable mechanical insider when I say it.

 

[Spirits Rising]

The above is a Clevis Pin and Fastener.

 

[Khamon]

That looks painful.