> Johnny,
> Regarding your photograph of April 5th @
>
8.14 a.m.
> ''Look at this Crystal Geyser label. It's
>
got 1 cup (240 mL). Up till now all 1
> cups I've seen with metric
labels, have
> shown 236 mL. Why are metric weights
> &
measures so erratic?''
Your assumption is incorrect! The cup is not a metric
unit and thus how it converts into metric units is dependant on individual
businesses interpretaion of what a cup is.
By US law, a product with a dual descriptive label
where the unit declarations are not exactly equal to each other, the contents
much contain at least the largest value.
If a business decides to use 240 mL or even 250 mL as a
base, and US law defines a cup as 236 mL, then said product must contain at
least 240 mL (since 240 mL > 236 mL) of product. The manufacturer may have
chosen to call the FFU equivalent as 1 cup because it was close enough and the
error is insignificant.
> Johnny, you are confusing four different
>
problems. The first, second, & third
> problems do not apply here.
You've come
> across the fourth problem.
> FIRST PROBLEM
> The measurement mess known
as FFU (Fred
> Flintstone Units) does not form
> a complete
system, it is therefore
> impossible to establish some standards.
Yes, this is true. FFU does not contain any units
useful in electricy/electronics, radioactive physics and other sciences and
thus is incomplete.
FFU is also incoherent and inconsistent, in that it
"rules" (term used loosely) allow for unit names to have multiple meanings and
a given quantity to have more then ine unique unit.
FFU also does not have any fundamental definitions
(base units) and thus has to depend on the SI units to establish itself.
Only SI is complete, consistent and coherent.
> SECOND PROBLEM
> The use of the same word
for completely
> different numbers. Take ''milli'' for
>
example. It is supposed to mean 1/1000,
> & it does, & it
doesn't. It can mean
> either 1/10, or 1/100, or 1/1000, or
>
1/10000. Most folks can only make sense of
> it all, if they treat each
metric standard
> as having no relationship with any other
>
metric standard. Although that works, it
> destroys the whole concept
of having any
> weights & measures. (Of course
> ''milli''
also means 1000, but if we go
> there, folks will just give up.)
Total nonsense! The PREFIX (not standard) milli means
0.001 of the base unit and nothing else. The prefix centi means 0.01, deci
means 0.1, and kilo means 1000. There is no prefix for 0.000 1, as there does
not need to be. The next prefix is micro meaning 0.000 001, then nano meaning
0.000 000 001. All the prefixes can be seen at:
http://www.bipm.fr/en/si/prefixes.html
The prefixes allow metric units to be scaled to measure
quantities smaller then the atom and as large as the galaxy. Can't do that
with FFU.
> THIRD PROBLEM
> Different countries have
different metric
> equivalents for Common Weights &
>
Measures. It's not a real problem in most
> cases. But if people say
it's a problem,
> then I guess it is. For instance, some
>
countries show 1 fl. cup as 237 mL,
> others as 236 mL.
Australia uses a cup of 250 mL. But so what! That is a
problem of FFU not metric. In metric there is no cup so who cares what the
inconsistent FFU units come out to be in SI?
> FOURTH PROBLEM
> This is the problem you've
stumbled across.
> In 1968, Betty Crocker & the U.S.
>
Commerce Dept. in an effort to promote
> metric Weights & Measures
to the U.S.,
> published an official government list of
> metric
cooking weights & metric
> fluid & dry measures. In it, 1 cup
> is 240 ml.
Again a problem with FFU, not with metric. Great chefs
the world over cook only in metric and never even care what a cup is. So, why
should anyone else.
