I agree with Alan's central point that stealth measures, done without fanfare or extensive public education, are the mostly likely ways to succeed in the US today. I disagree that road signs can't also be switched in an executive quick-strike, without waiting for a public buy in that will never come (they'll buy in a few weeks post switch), but that's perhaps a secondary point.
One of the things that is so tragic about the US situation is that we botched the historical moment in the 70's when this change seemed like a historical inevitability for the English speaking world. There was as sense that if we didn't change, we would be left behind. Sadly, when we failed to switch, the sky did not fall down. For the American public, nothing adverse happened, and the whole conversion drive because the butt of jokes. So yes, Australia is the ideal, and a coordinated national conversion effort like theirs is the best way to convert. But for US metric advocates to move forward and remain relevant today, we need to face the hard reality that the time when such an coordinated national effort might have materialized in the US is gone. So we can close up shop, or we can support a different approach. To me, our priorities need to be (1) fundraising, (2) hiring real political strategists and lobbyists, (3) watching them design and advocate for stealth measures for conversion, such as passing the FPLA revision, pressuring firms to drop conventional units, push for metric unit pricing at food retailers, etc. From: Pat Naughtin Sent: 03/01/2009 7:03 PM To: U.S. Metric Association Cc: USMA Metric Association Subject: [USMA:43322] Re: true metrification is systemic Dear Al, I am an outside observer of metrication in the USA. I live in Geelong Australia. I have interspersed some remarks in the emails sent to me by Jeremiah MacGregor and in your responses. I will write them in red. On 2009/03/02, at 1:04 AM, Jeremiah MacGregor wrote: Alan, I can't help you in your request, but I'm sure members of the USMA forum can. I don't know why you sent me this in a private message since it has mass appeal, so I am forwarding it on to the USMA to see if someone there can provide an answer. Jerry ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From: Al Lawrence <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2009 6:42:20 PM Subject: RE: true metrification is systemic A logical systematic approach won't work, but a stealth approach can. This is simply not true. Logical systematic approaches do work and there is ample evidence for this from Australia, New Zealand, India, Pakistan, and South Africa for examples; there are many others who were also quickly successful with their upgrade to the metric system. Already lots of products are sold in metric units and metric containers (most bottled water, some soda, mouthwash and shampoo, for example). These are also examples of where a logical systematic approach works and works well. Consider the cases you mention and how they came to be predominately metric. Someone inside the factory was doing a routine chemical test of the company's products and to do this he/she had to change all the old pre-metric measures to metric units to carry out the chemical tests because chemical tests have been done — only — in metric units since the mid 1800s (say about 1850). Our testing chemist might have asked, 'Wouldn't all of these tests be easier (and probably more accurate and precise) if we didn't have to do all the conversions — we could save the company a lot of money. Some companies took this advice and produced the 2 litre bottle. This is called 'direct metrication'. Other companies chose to bear the additional unnecessary costs and kept labelling their products in old-pre-metric measures. This is called 'hidden metric' because the product is prepared in metric units and then these are dumbed down for the public. I recall being in a brewery in Colorado where one of the beer vats had a sign facing the public that said, 52,840 gallons. Everyone who worked in the factory knew this quite naturally as 200 000 litres. Brewery calculations are quite difficult to do using old pre-metric measures and so simple to do using metric units that I don't know of any brewer in the world who does not use the metric system internally. Only in the USA and the UK are these internal calculations then dumbed down to things like 12 oz. bottles or cans and pints. As I said this process, that is peculiar to the USA (and the UK where they dumb the metric beer into 'pints') is called 'hidden metric'. If the metric-only labeling option amendment can be passed more of that will be done, and maybe products like the two liter soda bottle and water bottles will only be labeled in liters. Everyone knows what a two liter bottle is and almost no one knows how many pints quarts or gallons that is. True! Changing road signs and public education programs will just turn people off, but labels on supermarket products can be changed gradually without upsetting anyone and eventually everyone will know what a gram, kg and liter is. Then additional changes can be considered. Changing road signs has on many occasions proven to be best done in a day. This is how it was done in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and most recently in Ireland. Prior to the day of changeover some people who have little or no experience in road traffic matters will claim, 'there will be carnage on the roads' and similar conjectures. These simply do not happen. All the examples I listed went smoothly; they were almost completely finished on the designated day; and they didn't stop the conjecturers who then moved on to other aspects of metrication to attack (such as 'Bring back the pound and the pint!'). I am confidant that when the USA secides to change road signs to metric, they will follow the successful examples from all around the world and do the job in a single day. By the way, most nations call these m-days, meaning M for metric days. I am looking for a group that is trying to promote that, but does NOT waste time talking about road signs, education programs or metric conversion programs. All those things are nonproductive at this point, and might even be counterproductive. Just change supermarket labels first and don't scare people with that other stuff. I don't know what you mean by non-productive. Anywhere that there is an honest open metric sign that gives good honest open metric information to the public then that is a positive step forward for the metrication process. The current situation in the USA is that almost all measurement is done using the metric system as the basis. This is then dumbed down for the public. I think of this as a thin veneer of dishonesty. As an example take something simple like your height. As you no-doubt know, the feet you use for you height are metric feet that are defined in the USA as 304.8 millimetres exactly, and the inches you use are defined in the USA as 25.4 millimetres exactly. The use of feet and inches in the USA is simply a way of hiding the fact that the USA is already almost completely metric. Alan Lawrence ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 17:30:11 -0800 From: [email protected] Subject: Re: true metrification is systemic To: [email protected] Yes, it seems like we can't handle a systematic approach to anything we attempt. I just hope in the long term we don't end up on the bottom looking up. Jerry ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From: Al Lawrence <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 7:37:54 PM Subject: Re: true metrification is systemic While a systemic approach is undoubtedly the correct and logical way to convert to the metric system pushing for changing road signs, changing package sizes to round units, selling gas in liters and so on is not a good idea for the US. That would just play into the hands of the anti-metric people who can then rant about costs and confusion and inconvenience and get their Congressmen to vote against anything metric. It might be useful for you to refine your idea of anyi-metric people. It usually only takes one or two people to prevent metrication progress in the USA. These are usually, according to the best of my study and research, not organised into groups. Consider the killing off of the Metric Conversion Board which was accomplished by the activities of only two men (see http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/28/AR2006032802142.html and http://www.cadenhead.org/workbench/news/2893/keeps-metric-system-down The Food Marketing Institute (FMI) might be a similar case. Many of the FMI members clearly use metric units in designing, developing, and marketing their products yet the FMI claims that it is opposed to the option of metric only labelling that many FMI members might support. My suspicion is that the FMI anti-metric position arises internally within its bureaucratic structure — perhaps from a single individual. Australia was committed to conversion and did it right, True, Australia did have the non-political party commitment to metrication. This was important but it was nowhere near as important as the fact that we chose a few simple processes that worked well. We: * avoided metric conversion (see http://www.metricationmatters.com/metric_conversion.html ) * chose prefixes for almost all trades, crafts, and professions so that measurements could be in whole numbers rather than common or vulgar fractions and decimal fractions. You, in the USA, did this with your liquor in millilitres and your soft drinks in millilitres. These worked so quickly that most citizens of the USA did not notice the change to metric in these areas and probably could not now remember when they occurred. If you want long term befuddlement it is best to give people a choice of which metric unit to use; centimetres are good for this (see http://www.metricationmatters.com/docs/centimetresORmillimetres.pdf ) but anyone who has traveled abroad knows how provincial Americans can be. We will not have that kind of commitment in the US. The government can’t even get Americans to convert their on-air TV’s to digital after 18 months of advertising, public service announcements and government mailings of coupons. Change is always difficult if you enjoy the fog that conjecture can bring to any change discussion. Watch for the interplay of the media in this as they will automatically try to generate a debate about any issue as they thrive on the debate rather than the substance of the issue. The upgrade of the USA to the metric system is inevitable, and to a very large extent it has already happened (but it's hidden) but that does not make good copy for the media. Just get the metric-only option labeling amendment through. Don’t cause public panic by talking about changing road signs and package sizes. Metric labeling has to be common before there is any hope of making any significant progress. Not true. Metric progress is being made daily. Sure, the metric-only labelling option is important but much more important is the approach that you choose to take for your metrication process for yourself, your group, your work place, your company, your industry, or your nation. I have identified four approaches to metrication that you can find at http://www.metricationmatters.com/docs/ApproachesToMetrication.pdf The four approaches to metrication are: 1 Direct metrication 2 Hidden metrication 3 Metric conversion 4 Ignore it and it will go away The first of these works, it works well, it works quickly, and it will save you a lot of money. The other three approaches have yet to show any major results after a little over 200 years (2009 - 1799 = 210 years). The best you can hope for if you choose one of these three approaches is the extremely slow, painful, inefficient, and costly metrication that you see all about you in the USA. One of the executives at the FMI (Ty Kelley) once referred to this slow choice as 'metric creep'. Cheers, Pat Naughtin PO Box 305 Belmont 3216, Geelong, Australia Phone: 61 3 5241 2008 Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has helped thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the modern metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they now save thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for their businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many different trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial and government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA. Pat's clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST, and the metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA. See http://www.metricationmatters.com for more metrication information, contact Pat at [email protected] or to get the free 'Metrication matters' newsletter go to: http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter to subscribe.
