Pounded by the Metric System
Britain's heavy-handed mandating of metric measurements for
produce-selling may merit your lampooning, April 16 editorial
"A Pound of Flesh." Thomas Jefferson may merit it too. As you noted, he promoted the
very kilograms-and-meters "mathematical rationality" that you subordinate
to pounds-and-feet "tradition and instinct."
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But Jefferson was only partially "smitten with all things French"
concerning a metric system for commerce and science. He once scolded the
mathematician, philosopher and humanist Le Marquis de Condorcet about what
you rightly call "inaccurately" basing a length standard on equator-to-pole
distance. In fact, Jefferson promoted fundamentally defining length in
terms of time -- as is now done, despite your erroneous report that it's
still based on a longitude segment. The distance light travels in a tiny
time defines the modern meter.
A Jeffersonian metric system would have precluded the meters-vs.-feet
mix-up that lost us that NASA Mars probe. As this discussion continues,
let's not also lose sight of plain facts.
Steven T. Corneliussen
Poquoson, Va.
***
Although units are fundamentally
arbitrary, the English System is based on one of the most basic measurement
notions, that of halving and doubling. There are 16 ounces to a pound,
which means that if you cut your quarter-pounder in half and then in half
again, you have an ounce. Similarly, half of a quart is a pint, half of
that a cup and if you halve that three more times, you have a fluid ounce.
Half of that is a tablespoonful. Double a quart twice and you get a
gallon.
Although base-10 is the way we calculate, computers use base 2, so in
some ways the English System is far in advance of the metric. We use K's
and Megs these days, which are not quite M's and Millions. Metric
proponents proudly point to the fact that a liter of water weighs exactly a
kilogram. Fair enough, but "a pint's a pound the whole world round," or at
least once was. A fluid ounce of water weighs an ounce. The equivalence is
present in both systems.
The base-10 compatibility of the metric system was once thought to be a
boon to calculation and commerce. But by the time of the U.S. metric fad of
the 1970s, the calculator and, more to the point, calculating scales and
prepackaged meats, had rendered the arithmetical edge irrelevant.
Standardization of machine parts may make economic sense. Having to own
two sets of sockets, wrenches and taps is an expense. But then the world
might be a cheaper and more efficient place if we legislated only black
clothing.
Nevertheless, this reasoning does not apply to pricing of bananas. But
take heart, at least they let Mr. Thoburn sell his fruit for pence. How
long will it be before the London gold fixing is quoted in Euros per
gram?
Robert Prener
Professor of Mathematics
Long Island University
Brookville, N.Y.
***
It's fun, but too easy, to deride
the metric system and the measures used by 5.719 billion people -- 95.4% of
the world's population -- every day, for everything they do. The rest of us
buy cola in liters, video tape and film in millimeters, aspirin in
milligrams, and light bulbs in watts (electrical measures, and everything
in science, have always been metric-based). Our largest trading partners
and closest neighbors, Canada and Mexico, are metric countries. Major U.S.
industries, such as auto, machine tool, electronics, soft drink, liquor,
pharmaceutical and health care, are primarily or completely metricated. The
metric system is decimal-based, easy to use and coherent; the inch-pound
system is not. It is said that on the day India converted, illiterate
street vendors adapted in a few hours. Even Journal readers seem to have
taken to decimal-based stock trading without serious trauma. Let's let the
English stew over their archaic measures while we get on with it.
William Brenner
Chevy Chase, Md.
Ten Commandments: Still Solid as Rock
Your page-one article
April 18 was a succinct demonstration of why dismantling the Ten
Commandments is really an exercise in dismantling logic. The atheist
recites his mantra, "Don't impose your morals on me," while at the same
time expecting others to adhere to the Christian "Do unto others" -- the
Ten Commandments in a nutshell -- by not causing the atheist to be
"extremely upset and bothered."
I would like to thank atheists in Elkhart, Ind., for their arbitrariness
and inconsistency in not personally removing the offending plaque, thereby
allowing themselves to be restrained by the Eighth Commandment, and for not
coming after thinkers like me, in accord with the Sixth. If they truly
believed that atheism is correct, then logically speaking, they must also
believe that humans can do no wrong. If there is no God, then everything is
right. After all, which human is it going to be that decides what the rest
of us do? If we wanted to be nonmilitant about it, we'd be reduced to
peer-group pressure, as shown by the "local Jewish group" being manipulated
so as to not stand out against the democratic majority opinion.
Even democracy degenerates to tyranny. But a true atheist, a practicing
atheist, one who did not secretly harbor a "Thus sayeth the Lord"
mentality, would be perfectly tolerant of the neuro-chemical reactions in
the brains of some humans that cause them to believe in a God who has
spoken to all mankind -- loudly, clearly and publicly.
Jill Bray
Quincy, Ill.
***
Judge E.J. Ruegemer had much more
discretion in 1946 to help troubled youth than do the judges of today.
However, you say, "Moses's tablets didn't make it to the Promised Land
intact." This is not exactly true. While Moses did throw down the first set
of stone tablets due to his anger at the Hebrews slide to idolatry during
his 40 days on the Mount, God punished the hard-hearted faction and then
created a second set of tablets for the repentant, as described in Exodus
34:1. The Hebrews then carried these tablets in the Ark of the Covenant to
the Promised Land.
Eddie Kolodziej
Richardson, Texas
Do Hot Bowling Shoes Improve Your Game?
I was quoted in the April 17 page-one article
"Bowling Shoes Are So Hot, People Rent Them to Steal a
Pair" as saying, "I'm happy to have the theft." In a 20-minute
interview, I made my feelings clear that along with an increase in public
bowling comes an increase in shoe-rental business, and thus also comes an
increase in rental-shoe theft. I accept the increased theft because I know
that it comes along with the increase in business. To say only that I am
happy with the theft is irresponsible at the very least. Many of my
customers, friends and business associates read the article and will wonder
whatever could I have meant by stating that I am happy with the theft. I am
of course not happy with any theft and employ a security staff of 12
officers to combat theft and other crime at my establishment.
Gary S. Handler
Waveland Bowl
Chicago
***
Your placing some of the blame
for the theft of bowling shoes on the bowling alleys themselves is
ludicrous. Such rationalizing represents all that is wrong with the
apologetic left. By your thinking, consumer-goods manufacturers are to
blame for theft of their product because they are so audacious as to create
appealing product packaging. Get real.
Randy Roeing
Wheaton, Ill.
***
I find it interesting that you
accord the white petty thieves depicted in the bowling-shoe article enough
respect to refer to them as "Mr. Hamm," etc, while in the Detroit
kidnapping story the same day, the underclass African-Americans, criminals
and victims alike, are called simply "Skip," "Tone," "Bart," "Dawonne," and
so on. It's unusual for you to be so familiar with your subjects. Is it the
degree of criminality that makes the difference? The skin color? I was also
impressed that for the kidnapping story, you forewent your usual stipple
illustrations in favor of more realistic -- and more menacing -- mug
shots.
Ethan Smith
New York
***
Further to your bowling-shoe
report: While shadowing a suspect in a bowling alley, Hercules Poirot, as
played by Robert Morley in Agatha Christie's "ABC Murders," was trying to
rent bowling shoes. To the proprietor's request for his size, he replied;
"I really don't know, I've always had my shoes made for me." Compare that
bit of class with that of today's renter-thief.
James Waples
Sturgeon Bay, Wis.
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