Wednesday, August 26, 2020

Let's REALLY go metric, America!

 I favor passive-aggressive adoption of Metric. If we're going to get dragged into this thing, let's really make it hell for the rest of the world along the way!


All weather reports to be in Kelvin, the temperature scale of science. - It's 296 degrees outside right now, for example.


All mass should be measured in Grams/Kg, etc.  If you step on an old fashioned doctor's scale... you should be able to move the "weights" into balance, and determine your mass in Kilograms.  The average adult American male has a mass of 89.6 Kilograms


All WEIGHT, on the other hand, is a force, which should be measured in Newtons.... a NEW doctors scale should give your Weight in Newtons, which can then be converted by dividing it by the locally measured gravity field.   The average adult American male has a weight of .... turns out you can't say.... because it depends on local gravity.

Fortunately, I've found a site that shows you how to estimate that in only 3 minutes...

https://www.isobudgets.com/how-to-calculate-local-gravity/#:~:text=Established%20at%20the%20third%20General,32.174%20feet%20per%20second%20squared.&text=Measurements%20that%20may%20be%20influenced,Force


oh, speaking of Minutes, they need to go.  We should only use seconds since 1/1/1970 now, as it is one of the most widely adopted time scales on the planet.

A few moments ago, the time was 1598429919.


All road signs need to be re-calibrated in meters per second.


All "speedometers" need to be re-calibrated in RPS (Rotations Per Second) measured at the the wheel.  The diameter of tires change dynamically, and thus you can't reliably calculate speed.  The use of GPS might allow for actual speed measurement, if coverage allows.



Latitude and Longitude need to be expressed in Radians.  We can keep the Greenwich Meridian, as moving it to the proper new location presents too much of a political challenge... Beijing, Apple Headquarters, The Pentagon, see the trouble?


Astronomical measurements need to be updated as well. The 'parsec" needs to go, as it is earth-centric and arbitrary.  Light years are an unacceptable measure of distance as interstellar gas may effect the local speed of light.  Distance MUST be expressed in terms of meters.  All angles MUST be expressed in radians.

Americans have ignored this issue for far too long... let us lead the world to this better Metric Future!




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