Jim Elwell wrote:
<< American units evolved from British units during a period when
there was very little agreement as to what an inch was, or what an
ounce was, and the fact that they developed a bit differently in the
USA over the 200 to 300 years before things really started to
standardise has nothing to do with "wanting to be different.">>
could however very reasonably be called the Homer Simpson version of
history and is a long way from accurate.
As I understand it Newton published his results in French Paris livres
rather than English Troy or Avoirdupois pounds because he wanted to
reach a bigger audience. All these separate measures were well
understood, adequately accurate to his purposes, and had been rather
stable for several centuries prior to his birth. Newton was also
(like me) fascinated by the mathematical genius involved in matters to
do with historical measure.
Numerous comments:
(1) I don't claim to be a measurement historian. I was simply hypothesizing as to why some British and American units with the same name have slightly different values.
(2) I was doing that because I most assuredly do NOT believe it has anything to do with "Americans just want to be different."
(3) However, you have not entirely convinced me that I was wrong. While units might have been well defined amongst the scientific crowd, that was an extraordinarily small portion of the population, and there was little information flow between them and, say, merchants and farmers in rural America in the 1600s and 1700s.
My thinking on this is based on The Measure of All things (Ken Alder, 2003), where he discusses the plethora of measures used in France, and how it was common to see the same unit defined differently from one village to the next. Since "The Measure . . ." was done in the late 1700s (1792 - 1799), it is quite reasonable to presume there was a similar cacophony of units in use in the USA, particularly given that people in the USA had emigrated from a number of different European countries.
(4) Let me point out that you "homered" my thesis, but failed to provide any other explanation as to why American and British units differ.
SI is a widely accepted international standard that is very practical
(and in consequence rather dull). There are good arguments for
supporting it.
Although the posting you responded to did not reflect it, I am certainly a staunch and active supporter of the metric system. But I don't believe it should be forced onto anyone. If it truly is a better system, it will supplant other systems in time.
Having read postings to this list for a few months now
I find the campaign for metrification often seems to get mixed up with
separate matters to do with historical dumbing down, and also with
rather authoritarian attitudes to legislation. Speaking personally -
my fears of both dumbing down and authoritarianism are far greater
than my love of metrification. My thoughts often drift back to what
Orwell was saying in '1984' when I read some of the posts.
We are in total agreement on this.
Sorry if this gives offence - that isn't my intention - its just an
honest response to what I read.
No offense taken, at least by me!
Jim Elwell
Electrical Engineer
Industrial manufacturing manager
Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
www.qsicorp.com
