I have gotten tired of hearing the British and Americans say that SI is
French, and isn't their system. This morning while looking at torque
wrenches it stuck me as odd that they advertize them as using "English and
metric" units, but the metric units were newton-meters. I thought is was
silly saying Newton wasn't English, so I made this little table. Appears SI
is more UK than anything else. What did I miss, and did I get anything
wrong?
meter From the Latin metrum and the Greek metron, both meaning "measure."
kilogram From chilioi, the Greek word for a thousand + the Latin gramma,
which was a small weight similar to the English grain
second the second division of the hour, latin secundus
ampere French physicist Andr�-Marie Amp�re
kelvin English (Scottish?) mathematician and physicist William Thomson,
later Lord Kelvin
mole named by W. Ostwald, a German Chemist, from MOLekulargewicht.
candela From the Latin word for "candle."
radian named by James Thomson, brother of Lord Kelvin, latin radius.
steradian from the Greek stereos, solid + radian
hertz German physicist Heinrich Rudolf Hertz
newton English mathematician, and physicist Isaac Newton
pascal French mathematician Blaise Pascal
joule British physicist James Prescott Joule
watt British engineer James Watt
coulomb French physicist, Charles-Augustin de Coulomb
volt Italian scientist Count Alessandro Volta
farad British physicist Michael Faraday
ohm German physicist Georg Simon Ohm
siemens German electrical engineer Werner von Siemens
weber German physicist Wilhelm Eduard Weber
tesla (Croatian- (or Serbian-?))American electrical engineer Nikola Tesla
henry American physicist Joseph Henry
degree Celsius Swedish astronomer and physicist Anders Celsius
lumen from Latin for light
lux from Latin for light
becquerel French physicist, Antoine-Henri Becquerel
gray British physician L. H. Gray
sievert Swedish physicist Rolf Sievert
katal From "catalyst"?
Totals:
Non-proper name origin 10
English/British 6
German 4
French 4
American 2
Swedish 2
Italian 1
If you add the quasi-SI units of talbot, bel and neper you pick up two more
Brits and another American.
After spending some time doing this I found a nice web page that has a
similar list with pictures of the men (yes they're all men) involved.
http://indykfi.atomki.hu/indyKFI/MT/orig_si.htm
Quick what metric derived, but not SI, unit is named after a woman?
And on a off topic, what is the difference between British and English? I
suppose they used to swing swords at each other because of the distinction,
but in America at least in modern times the distinction has faded.
Since this is non-HTML the columns may get messed up in transit.
Cheers,
Scott C
