Dear Rob, I have interspersed some remarks.
on 2005-01-14 20.43, ewc at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Hi Pat > > The most up to date answers to all your questions as to WHAT happened > are pretty much as in > > A) R D Connor 'The weights and Measures of England 1987' (HMSO) & > > B) R D Connor and A D C Simpson 'Weights and measures in Scotland: > a European perspective' 2004 (National Museum of Scotland) > > As to WHY it happened I recommend you consult (A) but not (B). > > My personal opinion put simply is that Connor (who is a Canadian > physicist) told it more or less straight in 1987 but was kind of got > at by the "historical establishment" subsequently and used the 2004 > publication to recant. (primarily by moving to give Paris Troyes a > false priority over Anglo-Saxon Troy) > > I suspect (A) will be in most decent Australian reference libraries - > ought to be anyhow. Thanks for the references, and for your comments. I have heard of the first of these previously, but I have not got around to reading it. I will renew my efforts. > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > My core point all along on USMA recently is that confusion about > weight standards in the past was not driven by stupidity and > incompetence as the 'FFU' label tends to imply. (IMO) it was almost > always driven by deliberate chicanery. Perhaps 'twas ever thus. In my reading of historical documents, I am constantly remarking the corruption of weights and measures by those who have currently (and often temporarily) the power to do so. The corrupters may be kings, manufacturers such as gemmologists and goldsmiths, trading combines such as the early Chicago Board of Trade, or more usually trading cartels and/or individual traders. The most common corrupt practice is to buy with one set of weights or measures and sell in another set altogether. Although it is still current and common, this is a very old practice as might be seen by one of the continuing themes in the older religious texts. See Proverbs 20:10 'Divers weights, and divers measures, both of them are alike abomination to the LORD' and Proverbs 20:23 Divers weights are an abomination unto the LORD; and a false balance is not good. As examples traders might: Buy oil by the kilogram or tonne, publicly price it in barrels, and then sell it in (highly expandable with temperature) litres or gallons. Buy diamonds by the gram and kilogram and them sell in carats. Buy gold in milligrams, grams and kilograms and sell it in ounces (Troy?). Design, build, and construct computers in nanometres, micrometres, and millimetres before selling them in (nominal) inch screen sizes. The common threads in these tactics of 'deliberate chicanery' are the inclusion of the elements: obfuscation and confusion. > Consider England - (IMO) the > "peasants rebellion" of 1381 - which was organised by the provincial > middle classes and aimed primarily at foreign merchants and the > foreign pope - was likely in significant part triggered by the way > international bankers were rigging weights and measures to their own > benefit. (selling to a short 'avoirdupois' pound, buying at an ever > longer 'hundredweights' (104 then 108 then 112), trying to take �1 in > the pound seigniorage on the English florin etc etc etc. I can't comment on this period of history; it is unfamiliar territory to me. However, note that the examples I used above are from current (2005) sources as I believe that the 'deliberate chicanery' you refer to is still alive and well and thriving in the 21st century. I also believe that seeking fair, honest, and open measurement methods is an ongoing challenge against such deliberate chicanery. We are fortunate that we now have an international system of units (Le Syst�me d'Unit�s SI) that is a little more resistant to attack from national and sub-national forces but it is not immune from corruption from other international groups (such as OPEC, the diamond and gold cartels, or the Microsoft and Apple collusion). >There are > clear links from the Peasants Rebellion to Wycliffe to Huss to Luther > and so its very clear that, if I am correct, then about 300 years of > Europe-wide religious warfare (more like 600 years in Northern > Ireland) were initially tied to matters in significant part to do with > weights and measures. Again I can't comment, because of my ignorance, but I am fascinated by your thesis. Please elaborate further. >The big fuss about the English florin of 1849 > was not a base about Europe and decimalization. Interestingly, this was the florin that survived until it changed to the (decimal) 10�p coin of the decimalised pound in 1966. When the 1849 Florin, 'the first British "decimal" coin' was issued, it was 'a two-shilling piece which bore the words "one tenth of a pound". (see http://www.royalmint.com/talk/goingdecimal.asp ) > It was because > educated people in 1849 still understood what European bankers had > really been up to with the English florin of 1344. And the > destruction/confusion regarding nearly all records and standards that > bear on early English metrology are part and parcel of it being at the > heart of this political bonfire. > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > Like all big moral questions in history - questions about weights and > measures lead us back to the trial of Socrates. Was he 'telling the > truth' or 'misleading the young'? Again, no comment, because of my ignorance. More below. > best > > rob > > (Robert Tye, York, UK) > (PS sorry about the occasional capitals - but you did read 'ton' where > I wrote 'pound' in my last) Sorry about that � it was a silly mistake. However, to revisit your original remark: > It fails to > consider the fact that the US pound was and remains binary. In the light of our discussion above, it is interesting to conjecture that the reason that the pound was altered (to make it binary?) might simply have been more 'deliberate chicanery' in that the 'new' avoirdupois ounce (one sixteenth of 453.592�37�grams = 28.350�grams) was about 2.75�grams or 9�% smaller than the 'old' Troy ounce (in twelfths of a Troy pound 31.103�5�grams). I recollect an old riddle that encapsulated some elements of this cheating: Which is heavier � an ounce of gold or an ounce of feathers? Which is heavier � a pound of gold or a pound of feathers? For comparison: A gram of gold is exactly the same as a gram of feathers. A kilogram of gold is exactly the same as a kilogram of feathers. Cheers, Pat Naughtin Geelong, Australia 61 3 5241 2008 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.metricationmatters.com
