Dear all, First, let me say that I'm impressed by the quality of nearly all the postings that appear on this list - arguments that are well put together and make a lot of good sense.
But it has become apparent through reading all the postings and other literature, that it looks like the USA is only going to switch to the use of the SI system ONLY as a result of a major disaster. Nations with small population numbers can make changes more easily, and this includes the difficult subject of changing from something familiar to something new, such as their measuring system. At the time of metrication, Australia's population was only about the 11 million mark and people were not so vociferous as they might be today. The US has, however, a huge number of people who don't wish to change at all, citing their 'liberty' and 'freedom' as excuses without seeing the obvious benefits. While NIST's attempts at bringing the metrication issue to the public's attention is commendable, it's the same old story - you can lead a horse to water but you can't force it to drink. History will, unfortunately, repeat itself. It took the tragic collision of two fully loaded passenger airliners over the Grand Canyon to suddenly bring about the creation of today's air traffic control system. So it will be with metrication. Had the Mars Lander debacle caused loss of life, you can be certain that the US would be a lot closer to metrication than it is now. We can only wait. Regards, Mike Perth, Australia
