2003-03-20
This seems to me to be some trick by FFU-ists to
"defeat" SI by supposedly coming up with a "better" system to SI.
It's like saying to the government: "Hey, don't force us to go SI. We have
found an even better system then SI, Why don't we adapt it instead?" If
the government would decide to stop metrication, while they investigate the
claims, it gives the FFU-ists the opportunity to entrench FFU further.
If people are against SI because they don't like change,
they aren't going to be sold on this system either. It would still cost
"trillions" to adopt this as all types of instruments would have to be changed,
not only in the FFU world, but in the SI one as well. Those units may be
"close" to FFU units, but not close enough to keep old scales and
instruments.
Also, I will admit, I did not read through
everything, just a sampling of the unit definitions, but I didn't see how units
are scaled. For example:
The Planck unit of voltage is
VP = EP/e = Planck unit energy/elementary charge = (h-bar c5/G)�/e.
In metric terms, VP = 1.221 � 1028 volts.
With such a large value for the Planck voltage, how would I describe household voltage? What prefixes do they use? And, what do I do with my 300 � multimeter and 1500 � oscilloscope which would be rendered useless?
This "plan" has will have as much success as the whole world adopting the base 12 numbering system.
SI is here to stay.
John
----- Original Message -----
From: "Han Maenen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, 2003-03-20 01:58
Subject: [USMA:25227] Planck as proposed is ifp in
disguise
> destroyed, to be replaced by Planck-ifp units. This letter shows what is
> really behind this effort. Junk the Metric System board,
> http://www.network54.com/Hide/Forum/214108?it=1
>
> Apparent English bias of nature-based units (partial reply to JF Magana)
> December 24 2002 at 12:56 PM
> No score for this post Leonard (no login)
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> An interesting complication. JF Magana has sometimes criticized
> talent-mile and other proposed nature-based systems because of apparent
> bias. In adopting talent-mile units, he rightly points out, French-speakers
> would have to change *more* of their habits.
>
> Talent-mile has, or is perceived to have, more compatibility with
> traditional units used in several English-speaking countries notably UK and
> US. This question of bias was raised earlier and never completely addressed.
>
> To some extent it is an accurate criticism and I cannot do anything
> about it. All systems in which the main constants are made power-of-ten must
> consist of units which (at least to close approximation) are power-of-ten
> multiples of the natural or planck units--this is a mathematical fact. And a
> complete decimal system of that type must contain the mile (because the mile
> is a power-of-ten multiple of nature's length unit).
>
> As JF has pointed out (I had previously overlooked it) one of the
> power-of-ten multiples of the natural mass unit is roughly HALF A POUND.
>
> Instead, I had stressed that one billion times the natural mass
> roughly equals a classical greco-roman TALENT. This (approx. 48 conventional
> pound) talent is implicit in the Apothecary system still sometimes used,
> because a dram, drachma, or drachme has always been 1/6000 of a talent. If
> you multiply the dram apoth. by 6000 you essentially get the talent of
> talent-mile units.
>
> Indeed the talent is recognized by some people as a traditional
> British unit though it perhaps may not belong to the official Imperial
> system whatever that is. And in a broader sense it is in the general
> European tradition being embedded in our common history and literature.
>
> JF's comment bypassed all that business about the talent and simply
> pointed out that ten million times the planck mass is roughly half a pound.
> This could be good or bad depending one whether you approve or disapprove of
> an English-speaking bias.
>
> Anyway nature has these built-in units and by curious coincidence
> several of them are ENGLISH-FRIENDLY, that is related by simple comfortable
> ratios to quantities understandable in an English-speaking context.
> There is no *intentional* bias. That is just how the natural units
> are. Also except in the case of the mile (where the coincidence is amazingly
> close) the bias does not seem especially strong.
>
> If the French had only kept the (1.62 meter) medieval and nautical
> unit called "brasse" it would have been perfect for the pace or 1/1000 of a
> mile that we use which is 1.61888 meters. And it would be a personal
> satisfaction to accomodate that unit, if it were still much in use. BTW
> since the pace is an outright planckian unit like the mile, the foot as 1/5
> of a pace, is quasi-planckian in the way that JF suggested the pound was.
> Not exactly 1/10 pace but in a simple two-ish relation to 1/10 pace. Another
> reason to impute English bias if one is so inclined.
>
> So that future generations of humanity can have a clean efficient
> system of units in harmony with nature the metric system must be opposed in
> every possible way, attacked by every means, and eventually destoyed. This
> will begin, one may hope, by scientists volutarily adopting planckian units
> such as the talent-mile ones proposed here (or some others equally good) for
> teaching and recording data.
>
> Until that happens traditional units require every possible support
> since metric, not the traditional units of any people, represents the main
> threat to planckian units like the mile (and to quasi-planckian ones as
> well.)
> And in return traditional units and the love people have for them are
> the strongest possible allies of planckian ones and afford the best chance
> of beating metric.
>
> I am certainly not anti-French or anti-Labour. It is quite possible
> that French scientists could be among the leaders in adopting modern
> non-metric units for teaching and research. It is possible that the EU will
> ease off forcing metrication in Britain. The politics is free to change.
> What cannot change is that metric units are a bad fit with natural ones and
> so must eventually be phased out.
>
>
>
>
>
> Han
> Historian of Dutch Metrication, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
>
