All the media carried news of the EU’s decision to abandon plans to finally end the use of imperial measurements. It was lauded as a victory for the so called Metric Martyrs in the UK. (Surely that should be Imperial Martyrs as that is their cause not the metric system. Who ever heard of Roman Martyrs being fed to the lions because they were Christian?)
The Diageo were delighted too - the pubs can continue to serve pints of Guinness. The UK can keep their road signs in miles. Gold can still be traded in troy ounces.
It is important to note that this ruling applies to no other unit of measurement. The UK can still print 1 lb on their butter packaging but must also show the metric equivalent. I have not found an article that mentions acres and hectares but I assume the story is the same. Not that any estate agent uses what we call packaging when selling land. They use other ways and means.
The Irish Independent seemed overjoyed at the news although they regretfully admitted it was too late for Ireland to revert back to miles on road signs. (I’ll post the link tomorrow - the Indo make searching yesterday’s paper all but impossible unless the piece you want is in the most-read or most-emailed bracket).
So overjoyed was the Independent that they lost the run of themselves. Another article was on the heart-warming story of two-year-old Giedrute Kaledaite who travelled 25 miles as a stowaway on board a bus before being detected and reunited with her parents. I’m sure the Kaledienes, who are originally from Lithuania, had to whip out their calculator to understand just how far their daughter had journeyed.
Now high as a kite on imperial measurements, the Independent ran a piece about how Irish teenagers are taller and fatter than their predecessors. The average 14-year-old boy is now four stone heavier than his grandfather weighed when he was the same age, it reported. And while their grandfather in 1948 had an average height of 4ft 9ins, today’s 14-year-old stands at around 5ft 6ins tall. What teen reading this would have the slightest clue how heavy 4 stone is or how tall 5ft 6ins is? If the message to teens is about obesity then it will not get through using imperial measurements.
All of us under the age of 42 or so were schooled in the metric system. We were never taught about stones, pounds and ounces. We wouldn’t know how many yards or feet there are in a mile.
We do have a sense of how long a mile is having having had road signs in that unit until recent times. We know what a pint is for obvious reasons. Some of us may have been apprenticed to a tradesman who insisted we use feet and inches. Some may have lived in the UK and US and had to adopt to their measurements. But most under 40’s do not have a solid grasp of imperial measurement.
The Irish Independent needs to realise that, EU decision or not, metric is the statutory standard of this country. By using imperial that newspaper is alienating it’s readers.
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I always thought it was odd that in the States we still hang on to imperial measurement. I was schooled in the metric system also-but in preparation for the big change over that never came. We have a crazy hybrid of the two.
We buy soda in 2 liter bottles, but milk by the gallon.
Crazy.
Living in Spain everything was kilos and centimetres and kilometres, so I found near impossible to switch back when I came home. I suppose the more people travel abroad the less the old system will be used until eventually it will be phased out rather organically.
The indo is a frightful rag. I coined the phrase ‘Indo-true’ (could be, probably not) the other day to facilitate reading their version of events.
I hate the indo - I still read it every day online though as it’s free - gone are the good old days when the Times was too…
Sugar - Correct me if I’m wrong, but the US Congress passed a law in 1901 adopting metric as the standard. That was a whole 70 years before Ireland did.
Correct me on this too, but isn’t a US gallon and ton different to UK ones? Just to complicate things even more and to punch a hole in the argument in favour of the UK retaining the imperial system because the dual measurements made it easier to export to the US.
FMC - Indo-true! Excellent! Am I just being nostalgic, but wasn’t it a reputable paper not too long ago? What happened?
Yes, the change will come organically but I reckon the driving force will not be people who travel but the kids growing up will be what drives it. The metric system is taught in British schools.
Conorín - €79 for a year is a bit steep for the Times online. Have your tried the Irish Examiner? I don’t read it regularly but it had some good observations on this story: When the European Commission held a public inquiry about the pending change earlier this year, it got hundreds of submissions from Britain, but not one from Ireland.
Local authorities and teachers were very much in favour of having a complete change from imperial to metric, pointing out that all children are taught metric in British schools.
I once tried to measure planks of wood in inches for my uncle. The problem came when trying to deal with measurements smaller than an inch. 8ths and 16ths etc. Madness, who writes/thinks in octal?!
needless to say I switched to metric and the cut was more accurate and I was less annoyed.
According to Wikipedia, there was a Metric Conversion act of 1975. (thus the push when I was in grade school in the 70’s) This was suppose to increase the use of the metric system, but the act didn’t implement a 10 year conversion period-it was voluntary. The board that was created to guide the conversion was ignored by the public and in 1982, disbanded altogether.
We are coming around slowly but surely. Rulers have both US customary and metric. Liquid measuring cups have both. We run 5Ks,(I don’t personally, but you know)but we drive miles.
As far as gallons and tons being different from the UK? I don’t know. Again, I give you Wikipedia. (for better or worse)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_the_Imperial_and_U.S._customary_systems
Mixing one’s units is an expensive business
http://edition.cnn.com/TECH/space/9909/30/mars.metric.02/
Niall - Here’s your brother! Tradesmen doing work for me often give me measurements like that and I just go a retake them in millimetres. Who writes/thinks in octal? Me, but seldom. I think in hex more frequently. Blame these damn computer chip thingies.
Sugar - We I said US Congress passed a law in 1901 adopting metric as the standard, the stress should have been on Standard. That is when the National Bureau of Standards (NBS), now known as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), was created.
Making the conversion voluntary was a bit of a boo-boo. People seldom bother if something’s optional. That said, the kids who are schooled in it will be the ones who drive it’s adoption. It is so damned simpler when units of length, area, volume and mass are so interlinked.
Aonghus - There were similar issues at the early design stages of Concorde. Thankfully they were iron out.
my mum still can’t get the fact that the car speed thing is in KM and not Miles so we drive everywhere at 60km - painful.
Here in Canada there’s an odd mix of systems. Sometimes I need to order 500 grams of something and then other times it’s a pound.
Everyone should just pick one unit of measurement and stick to it already.
I think I’ve finally converted to the C over F temperatures.
Flirty - Jayzez, she’ll end up appearing on shitedrivers.com! I have one elderly neighbour who drives at 60km/h too - but only for journeys up to 10miles (really!) - further distances, and he drives at upto 80km/h. His reasoning is that there’s no need to speed if you’re not going far.
Medbh - Very strange indeed. Although I once seen a handyman measure a window pane in inches vertically and centimetres horizontally because it happened to be more exact that way. He didn’t have to use fractions of an inch or decimals of a centimetre.