Blame the astronomers at NASA. The International Astronomical Union
(IAU) is quite strongly in favor of using SI. I've posted their
statement (from their authors' guide) here a few times before.
But the American Astronomical Society (AAS) is hopelessly bogged down in
cgs (don't ask me which flavor). Since the bulk of the major
astronomical journals are funded and published by Americans, AAS
sentiment overrules IAU sentiment. Yes, the Astronomical Almanac and
similar AAS publications will provide you with the diameter of the Sun
and our mean orbital distance from it, the astronomical unit, in
centimeters.
Jim
Pierre Abbat wrote:
On Monday 30 November 2009 16:06:39 [email protected] wrote:
Anyone have an idea why the article (from our friends at NASA ;-) below
would mention ergs for energy?
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/stereo/news/solar_tsunami.html
Beats me. It's not out of range of prefixes applied to the joule, assuming
that "1029 ergs" is supposed to be "10^29 ergs" (10^22 joules). When I run
the megatons of TNT through the units program, however, it comes out on the
order of 10^19 joules.
The erg is obsolete, except in the Sahara, where it is still in use, along
with the chott and the jebel. :)
Pierre
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