On a related note, a couple of weeks ago two new people, middle-aged women, came to the Washington Cathedral to start learning how to ring the peal bells. I usually get there early for practice so when I got to the ringing room I saw that the door at the top of the stairs to the belfry was open so I went up there. The instructor, British, was showing the women the bells, how they work, the need to stand clear of them, etc. He then said that the bells were measured "properly", by which he meant hundredweight (cwt, 114 lb), quarters (qr, 28 lb), and pounds. He also said that where he came from, people also weighed themselves "properly", in stone and pounds, and "that's the way it has always been done."
I mentioned that I really only understood the kilogram; he gave me a look, and the two women responded neutrally. People have rung peal bells for over 400 years, and back then it was the rare person who had more than a few years of education. Large numbers to them were incomprehensible. So people broke things down into a whole range of named units, each sized so that there would in most cases never be more than a two-digit number to describe it. To them, 32 cwt 0 qr 4 lb was much more understandable than 3588 lb. 3588 was just way, way too big a number to understand. And for a person's weight, 13 st 4 lb was easier to figure out than 186 lb. Even 186 was just too big. Keep the numbers small, and the innumerate can figure them out. And now that this is in the culture - don't you EVER change it. Ever! (My guess as to why cwt and qr and st never caught on in the USA - somehow kids as they went through school were able to understand larger numbers. I may be quite wrong here so the thoughts of others would be good.) Incidentally, on the bronze plaque in our ringing room, the ten bells are described by number (1 through 10), note, inscription, who gave each one, and the weight - in pounds only. (The plaque was made around 1964.) Yet, when a quarter peal or full peal is recorded in the book, the weight of the tenor (largest) bell is noted - and it's always in cwt. Tradition.) Carleton -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tom Wade Sent: Thursday, January 17, 2008 08:27 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:40115] Re: Hostile reactions to "speaking metric" > She said - "we all do our own weights in > lbs so I guess that's why we do it for babies". But do they really ? I thought that people in the UK tended to use stones and pounds for their weight rather than just pounds. [Reminder to American readers than 1 stone is 14 pounds]. Even though one unit is common to both, it is effectively two different systems, one for adults (using a base 14) and one for children (using base 16). The real reason they do it this way, is that they have always done it this way. --------------------------------------------------------- Tom Wade | EMail: tee dot wade at eurokom dot ie EuroKom | Tel: +353 (1) 296-9696 A2, Nutgrove Office Park | Fax: +353 (1) 296-9697 Rathfarnham | Disclaimer: This is not a disclaimer Dublin 14 | Tip: "Friends don't let friends do Unix !" Ireland
