On 2009/03/16, at 2:35 PM, <[email protected]> wrote:
Diversity of units of measurement (e.g. many choices by vendors for
units of volume or capacity) clearly facilitates confusion in trade
and commerce, and deceit of consumers in the market place.
…
Gene.
Dear Gene,
The battle against diversity of units is a long one. It goes back at
least the earliest books of the Bible.
When I heard that a single bureaucrat, Guenter Verheugen, had
successfully condemned the UK to at least another hundred years of
dual measurements with their associated confusion and cost, I wrote
this (unpublished) article:
Devers weights and Devers measures
Pat Naughtin
'Game, set, and match' trumpeted the Conservative MEPs as soon as the
first ball, of the first set, was served. Hearing that a single German
bureaucrat, Guenter Verheugen, had condemned the UK to at least
another hundred years of dual measurements with their associated
confusion and cost, the UK Conservative MEPs strangely expressed
delight. How odd!
When Bishop John Wilkins invented the 'universal measure' that became
the modern metric system — in London — in 1668, he was trying to
protect English shoppers from unscrupulous and dishonest traders.
Then, as now, some people were prepared to use the measuring confusion
caused by multiple measures to gain commercial advantages by cheating.
Bishop Wilkins was an extremely practical man who knew about the
problems of dual measures by directly observing the dishonesty of
commercial traders. He probably based some of his sermons on Biblical
texts that railed against the dangers of dual measures that the
English High Street traders knew how to exploit by using quotes such as:
Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights, a great and a small.
Thou shalt not have in thine house divers measures, a great and a
small. Diverse weights and diverse measures, both of them alike are an
abomination to the Lord. (Deuteronomy 25:13-14)
Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances, and with the bag of
deceitful weights.' (Micah 6:11)
Awareness of the possibilities for cheating was not new, even in 1668.
Early books of the Christian Bible treat measurement almost as a
running theme. See: Leviticus 19:35-36, Isaiah 5:10, Ezekiel 45, and
Amos 8:5.
Anti-metric campaigners in the UK, who call themselves 'metric
martyrs', have decided to run a campaign to take measures in the UK
back to old, unchecked, scales and bowls to sell fruit and vegetables.
To my knowledge there has never been a standard bowl and I have no
doubt that the traders intend to choose the size of their own bowl. I
also doubt that they would simply fill any bowl that a customer
brought to their market stall. I don't think that Richard Ashworth,
Conservative Member of the European Parliament (MEP), really means it
when he says: 'Consumers should be able to buy in the measurement of
their choice'.
The use of old unapproved scales and a bowl effectively shifts control
of measurement definitions from the government to individual traders
with the legal effect of taking measurement law to some time before
Magna Carta when anyone could decide the size(s) of the containers
they use to buy and sell.
The anti-metric campaigners have chosen a trader named Janet Devers to
be their latest metric martyr. Presumably she will choose her own size
of bowl and with an illegal set of scales, her own standard for
weight; we could think of these as Devers weights and Devers measures.
In fact, I can't get this line out of my head whenever I think of her
name:
Devers weights and Devers measures, both of them alike are an
abomination to the Lord. (Paraphrased from Proverbs: 20)
Mr Giles Chichester, UK Conservative MEP proudly proclaimed the
continuation of multiple measures in the UK when he said: 'It was
ultimately the European Commission that listened to Conservative
pressure to keep pounds and ounces indefinitely … The Government may
be eager to scrap the pound as our currency, but at least we can say
we have saved it indefinitely – as a measurement at any rate.'
The oddly progressively named, Secretary of State for Innovation,
Universities and Skills, John Denham, whose department is responsible
for national weights and measures, is reported to have said: 'People
in Britain like their pint and their mile. They should be able to use
the measures they are most familiar with and now they can be sure that
they will continue to do so. We made strong arguments for the UK’s
right to carry on using pints and miles and maintaining dual metric
and imperial labelling'.
Bishop John Wilkins would roll over in his grave, in the St Lawrence
Jewry church in central London, if he knew of this opinion from
someone who is supposed to be a leader in Innovation, Universities and
Skills as John Wilkins was indeed a leader in developing Innovation,
Universities and Skills when he was the only person ever to be a
Master of a College at both Oxford and Cambridge, a writer of science
fiction, an internationally recognised 'scientist' in the 17th
century, and the principle founder of the Royal Society.
The chief executive of Britain’s oldest brewer, Jonathan Neame, said
he was delighted the British pint had been saved. 'It was crazy that
Europe should think it could interfere with such a British icon', he
said. Mr Neame's remarks were illustrated with a photo of 500
millilitres of beer and 70 millilitres of froth in a 570 millilitre
glass illustrating that whenever anyone asks for: 'A pint of beer,
please?' in the UK, they normally receive almost exactly 500
millilitres of beer. A pint of British beer has been an illusion
maintained by the brewers — who work inside their breweries
exclusively in metric measures — for a long time.
In 1980, the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) released a report
comparing the industrial use of metric units (only) to the use of
multiple measures. They found that the metric only companies could
expect to reduce their costs by about 9 % of their overall turnover,
and to increase their net profits by about 14 % when compared to the
users of multiple measures. European Union Industry Commissioner,
Guenter Verheugen, with a single stroke from a German bureaucratic
pen, did what two world wars were not able to do, beat the British
into the sort of submission where industrial costs to the people of
the UK have been increased relative to all other European nations by
about 9 %. Guenter Verheugen is quoted as saying: 'this is good news
for the people in the UK and Ireland who prefer to use pints and miles
as current practices will remain in place', and then he probably went
home that night well satisfied with his day's work.
Reference: http://www.metricmartyrs.co.uk
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
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