I personally thought the point was to confuse the reader with the historic units. I like it they way it is, but I might suggest adding something with a more practical and applicable note, like volume measurement for cooking. Almost anyone can figure out how clumsy it is, especially if a recipe was compared to the metric system. It should probably be reinforced that there are metric measuring tools though, for those who are unsure.
3 TSP -> 1TBSP (4TSP in Australia I believe, but those are nice 5ml teaspoons and 20ml tablespoons) 1TBSP -> 1/16c or 0.5oz 2c -> 1 pint 2 pints -> 1 quart 4 quarts -> a gallon (US measures, I think Imperial gallons are 160oz?) Most people don't even remember that correctly. It's so haphazard and painful. Weight is a little bit better, but still awkward. 16oz -> 1 pound 2000lb -> 1 ton Metric is so beautiful in comparision: 200ml -> 0.2l 200l -> 0.2kl 200mg -> 0.2g 200g -> 0.2kg 2000kg -> 2000 Mg or 2000 tonnes Actually, today at a bakery I was shocked to hear the cashier (who I think was also a baker) tell me that the regular loaves were "a couple hundred grams" lighter than the extra-large loaves. This is in North Carolina, United States. The bakery is the Flat Rock Village Bakery; they make really good sourdough bread (I'm sure the metric system helps ;-) ). Maybe he was an immigrant used to the metric system, but either way that made me tip them my change :-). Very nice to see a little metric used so openly here every once in a while. Cheers, Teran PS: I know this is mostly off topic, but it would be really nice to see Mm used more. Thousands of kilometers is quite a bit longer to say. On Tue, Sep 22, 2009 at 14:25, <[email protected]> wrote: > > Pat, > > Your comprehensive history of units (the right side of your poster) is of > interest to historians of metrology, but it can only confuse members of the > general public. > DELETE IT ENTIRELY from any proposed poster for Metric Week. > > Concentrate on base units meter, kilogram, second, and ampere (without the > other base units); and only the prefixes milli, centi, kilo, and mega > (without the other prefixes except, perhaps. micro for which the Greek symbol > is a problem). > > More curious readers can add the details of SI from carefully chosen > citations of NIST and USMA sources. > > Gene Mechtly. > > ---- Original message ---- >>Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2009 07:02:28 +1000 >>From: Pat Naughtin <[email protected]> >>Subject: [USMA:45871] Re: Posters >>To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]> >> >> Dear Stan and Harry, >> Thanks for your comments. My reaction is as follows: >>________________ >>________________ >> I would appreciate any further comments before I do >> anything with this. >> Cheers, >> >> Pat Naughtin >> ... > >
