At 04:34 PM 1/29/2002 -0800, Ma Be wrote: >On Tue, 29 Jan 2002 15:56:33 > Jim Elwell wrote: > >I think that what is missing is education. There are very few businesses > >who, if they saw a financial benefit in a reasonable time, would not start > >switching. > > >Excellent point! Agreed! Perhaps we could do more to *show* these >businesses what they can actually do with SI!
Add this to my list of things YOU can do to help metric. (That's the generic, "everyone who is reading this" version of "YOU"!!) >...I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but... what could be so >different 'economic-environmentwise' about the USA that would cause the >standard approach to metrication to fail? I was not claiming that mandated metrication would fail, only that there is no evidence that non-mandated won't work, because where it has failed the global economic environment has been different than it is today for the USA. > >If you disagree with my conclusion to that premise, Marcus, then are you > >saying that some country (or industry) in the world should switch to some > >more rational time measurement system, the rest of the world be damned? > > >Perhaps, why not? I think we have a very fundamental difference here. To me, measurement systems are "means" not "ends". If we have a universally-accepted and workable version (i.e. time), why change it? Any such change would be terribly expensive, and I cannot imagine the cost could be recovered in any reasonable amount of time. But, if that could be shown to be incorrect, perhaps I would change my mind. > >I stand by my statement: switching to a different measurement system > >contrary to everyone else in the world is foolish. If you disagree, do you > >have some kind of metric clock in your house? > > >He, he... The only reason I don't have a 'metric clock' here is because >I'm still coming to grips with what clock system would be THE best! Man, I should have known....!!! >For your info, Jim, I did a similar study of this type of issue concerning >the change of grading systems ... I discovered based on my assumptions >that regardless of how heavy the initial costs were, **provided** savings >were made year after year operationally (as you conceded it could be the >case!), corrected for the discount rates, evidently. This can even be >shown mathematically to be true *regardless*! I believe there needs to be a rational recovery period, somewhat shorter than infinity. 30 years or so would be appropriate, 100 years would be too long to be justifiable. These are just gut feelings -- I cannot support them beyond that. > >>Yes and no, actually. Technically speaking obviously, but practically > >>speaking? Forget it! > > > >I think the economic success of the USA proves you wrong on this point, > Marcus. > >... >I don't think so! All it proves is that you're still being able to turn >up a profit using ifp, but at what cost??? Now, imagine a fictitious >competitor being able to capitalize fully on the benefits of the SI.... Now, if only you and I could take a month off, meet in a huge conference room, call on all our respective experts, generate some humongous spreadsheets, and examine this in detail, we might be able to do an analysis that we could both believe that would answer this question. Aside from that, I'm afraid we will have to agree to disagree on this point. Jim Elwell
