Bill, I fully agree with your views on words, symbols, and values of quantities (e.g. 100 meters, or 100 m) and will apply these interpretations in the third draft of FPLA 2010, but with spellings of American English as directed in the Style Manual of the US Government Printing Office.
As an election judge yesterday from 4:00 through 19:50, with a continuous flow of voters from 6:00 through 19:00, I had no time then (on April 7) to work on SI projects. Gene. ---- Original message ---- >Date: Tue, 7 Apr 2009 14:51:39 -0400 >From: Bill Hooper <[email protected]> >Subject: [USMA:44461] Re: FPLA 2010 >To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]> > > On Apr 5 , at 5:47 PM, <[email protected]> > <[email protected]> wrote: > > (A) (i) if on a package, labeled in terms of > mass, shall be expressed in g or its multiples; > (ii) if on a package labeled in terms of linear > measure, shall be expressed in m or its > multiples; > (iii) if on a package labeled in terms of area, > shall be expressed in m2 or its multiples; > > (iv) if on a container labeled in terms of volume > or fluid measure shall be expressed in m3 or > its multiples, or ml, mL, or L. > > Sorry, but I can't agree that units symbols should > be used in place of unit names (written out) in text > material. Unit symbols are "symbols" and should be > used with symbols, like "25". All numerically > written numbers are symbols. "25" is a symbol, > "twenty-five" is a word. Thus write "twenty-five > metres" or write "25 m" but generally avoid writing > "twenty-five m" and "25 metres". (I admit that the > latter is commonly accepted.) > The normal extension of that, from the SI point of > view, is that unit symbols are not intended to be > used with words in ANY situation, such as the above > quoted material from Gene Mechtly. It should say > "... expressed in grams ...", definitely not "... > expressed in g ...", and likewise in all the other > examples in his text. > This has to do as much with good writing style as it > does with SI. I may have to interpret the intent of > the SI rules to make my case, but the writing style > rules are clear. Good writing does not allow words > to be supplanted by symbols except where the symbol > is part of an expression that is normally written > that way. > One does not report a medical check-up by writing "I > saw the Dr. today" nor "It only cost a $ to buy the > magazine". We write "I saw the doctor today" and "It > only cost a dollar to buy the book". > However, since "Dr." is traditionally used as part > of a title, it is proper to write "I saw Dr. Smith > today". Also, since "$" is typically used to express > amount of money in dollars, it is proper to write > "It only cost $1 to buy the magazine." > The rule for most of the above could read: > "Use words with word and symbols with symbols, no > mixtures." > That would cover the above situations and also some > other annoying uses like the following. > Bad and common: > kilometres/hour > (which is in the form of word-symbol-word) > Less common but equally bad: > km per hr > (symbol-word-wrong symbol), > and worse yet but unfortunately quite common: > kph > (wrong symbol-abbreviation-symbol) > The only acceptable forms are: > all in symbols, > km/h (as in "The car went 85 km/h down the > road.") > and > all in words, > kilometres per hour (as in "The speed limits are > posted in kilometres per hour.") > > Bill Hooper >...
