Metrication

[kkt]

1 light nanosecond = about 30 cm, yes?  You'd want a smaller unit also.

[Scott5114]

At least rainfall measured in inches creates ridiculously small values, because inch is the smallest commonly used unit.

Rainfall is measured in hundredths of an inch. Any lower than that is reported as "trace" (since amounts that small are more or less impossible to accurately measure regardless of the unit used).

[kalvado]

Height should be measured in light-nanoseconds.

1 light nanosecond is 2% different from the foot. Believe it or not, I use that relationship once in awhile

[Rothman]

At least rainfall measured in inches creates ridiculously small values, because inch is the smallest commonly used unit.

Rainfall is measured in hundredths of an inch. Any lower than that is reported as "trace" (since amounts that small are more or less impossible to accurately measure regardless of the unit used).

How many traces to a furlong?

[Big John]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

[Poiponen13]

At least rainfall measured in inches creates ridiculously small values, because inch is the smallest commonly used unit.

Rainfall is measured in hundredths of an inch. Any lower than that is reported as "trace" (since amounts that small are more or less impossible to accurately measure regardless of the unit used).

I meant that in US, rainfall is measured using inch as a unit, with precise to two decimals. I just looked only to integer parts of inch values, and they seemed ridiculously small.

[Scott5114]

At least rainfall measured in inches creates ridiculously small values, because inch is the smallest commonly used unit.

Rainfall is measured in hundredths of an inch. Any lower than that is reported as "trace" (since amounts that small are more or less impossible to accurately measure regardless of the unit used).

I meant that in US, rainfall is measured using inch as a unit, with precise to two decimals. I just looked only to integer parts of inch values, and they seemed ridiculously small.

I'm failing to see what, if any, problem exists here.

[J N Winkler]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

Specifically, it is an unit for dynamic viscosity.  I had to become familiar with kinematic viscosity (basically, dynamic viscosity divided by density) in order to interpret the specification sheets I used to decide which automatic transmission fluids to use in the family vehicles.  The unit commonly used is the centistokes (named after the Stokes of Stokes' Theorem, often "centistoke" in the US).  These sheets usually quote kinematic viscosity at 100° C, typically in a range of 5-7.5 cSt.

Current-generation ATFs (Dexron VI, Toyota WS, Honda DW-1) tend to be semi-synthetic and are designed to minimize pumping losses, with fairly low kinematic viscosities but greater shear stability.  However, all of our vehicles are old enough to have had last-generation ATFs as OEM specification (Saturn ATF, Toyota T-IV, Honda ATF-Z1), and these tend to use conventional basestocks and to be thick out of the bottle but shear down rapidly.

I found the cars were happiest with shear-stable full-synthetic ATFs that come close to matching the respective OEM specifications for kinematic viscosity.  For the Saturn especially, this means using Castrol TranSynd or equivalent (sold by the gallon because it is designed for heavy-duty applications such as RVs and garbage trucks), as it comes closest to the almost 8 cSt of Saturn ATF and hardly shears down in heavy use.

[vdeane]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

[Big John]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

The internet wasn't there yet.  I think the purpose of this exercise was to get the freshmen to try to converse with upperclassmen to get the definition.  Much harder for some than others.

[kalvado]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

The internet wasn't there yet.  I think the purpose of this exercise was to get the freshmen to try to converse with upperclassmen to get the definition.  Much harder for some than others.

Did they ever tell you where the library was on campus?

[J N Winkler]

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

This was a weed-out course, so adversity is the point.  Tests on material not discussed in class or part of assigned reading, exam questions the professor himself can't solve, office hours for just 30 minutes once a week when he's smoking like a chimney--all par for the course.

[kkt]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

The internet wasn't there yet.  I think the purpose of this exercise was to get the freshmen to try to converse with upperclassmen to get the definition.  Much harder for some than others.

But they had the Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.  The Rubber Bible, we called it.

[Big John]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

The internet wasn't there yet.  I think the purpose of this exercise was to get the freshmen to try to converse with upperclassmen to get the definition.  Much harder for some than others.

But they had the Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.  The Rubber Bible, we called it.

but was unknown to engineering freshmen.

[kkt]

In a freshman engineering class, there was an assignment that had an item measured in centipoise (cP) and told to convert it to other units.  Of course, none of the students ever heard of that term and asked what it meant.  The instructor refused to answer that question. (was a weed-out course).  Later learned that term in a junior-level fluids course that it is a measure of viscosity.

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

The internet wasn't there yet.  I think the purpose of this exercise was to get the freshmen to try to converse with upperclassmen to get the definition.  Much harder for some than others.

But they had the Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.  The Rubber Bible, we called it.

but was unknown to engineering freshmen.

We used it starting in 10th grade.

[vdeane]

How is someone supposed to do a conversion if they don't even know what one of the units even is?  Reminds me of the joke about a calculus word problem consisting of "If Bartholomew has 10 apples and is traveling at 25 mph, what is the distance from the Earth to the Moon?".

This was a weed-out course, so adversity is the point.  Tests on material not discussed in class or part of assigned reading, exam questions the professor himself can't solve, office hours for just 30 minutes once a week when he's smoking like a chimney--all par for the course.

Aren't weed-out courses supposed to be merely difficult rather than impossible?  They're not much use if literally everyone fails.

Clarkson's weed-out courses mainly consisted of the freshmen Calculus, Chemistry, and Physics classes, since most people (outside of business majors) had those in common.  Still, while the tests and a few of the homework problems were difficult, they were all doable by people who paid attention in class, did the work, studied hard, and had an aptitude for science/engineering.  They also had plenty of time for people to get help if needed between office hours for the professors and TAs.  I suspect the intro Computer Science classes were used as this for the Digital Arts and Science majors, but I found them fairly easy, so it's hard to say for sure.

[kkt]

Depends partly how it's graded, I suppose.  Failure to solve a problem the professor can't solve might not be a fail if the student makes a reasonable attempt at the problem.

[Poiponen13]

Read this article. Australia went from similar situation as US to almost complete metrication in the 1970s. Could US do the same in next 20 years? I would like that to happen.

[Scott5114]

I would like that to happen.

People with way more money than you would like it to not happen. Since we're talking about America, that means it will not happen.

[hotdogPi]

I would like that to happen.

People with way more money than you would like it to not happen. Since we're talking about America, that means it will not happen.

Aren't there some companies that would prefer it to happen? For example, food companies that would have to make fewer sizes for each product. This is already happening somewhat with 2L soda bottles in the US and 355 mL (= 12 fl oz) soda cans in Canada, but that's only a small portion of what you can find on the shelves.

EDIT: The 1970s is when we attempted to switch. There could have been a big push by the oil companies to switch to liters to avoid adding an extra digit to the prices. Why didn't they?

[Poiponen13]

I would like that to happen.

People with way more money than you would like it to not happen. Since we're talking about America, that means it will not happen.

I would be eternally happy when temperatures in national weather forecasts and weather.gov are changed to Celsius. This should happen asap.


Also, why Australia succeeded in metrication, but not US?

[kalvado]

I would like that to happen.

People with way more money than you would like it to not happen. Since we're talking about America, that means it will not happen.

Aren't there some companies that would prefer it to happen? For example, food companies that would have to make fewer sizes for each product. This is already happening somewhat with 2L soda bottles in the US and 355 mL (= 12 fl oz) soda cans in Canada, but that's only a small portion of what you can find on the shelves.

Between product shrinkage, automated packaging lines, and labeling weight guidelines - nobody seemingly  cares about round numbers any more. For example, I am looking at a roll of electric tape of 22' / 6.7 meter; and it is apparently labeled for sale in any place where the tape is legal to use. For whatever reason, 19 mm = 3/4" also seem a fairly universal width for electrical tape in metric world as well.
As it was mentioned, there is a lot of metrication under the hood (literally! US cars are metric now). For example Intel makes 5 nm chips on 300 mm wafers. 
Let things run their natural way....

[Scott5114]

I would like that to happen.

People with way more money than you would like it to not happen. Since we're talking about America, that means it will not happen.

I would be eternally happy when temperatures in national weather forecasts and weather.gov are changed to Celsius. This should happen asap.


Also, why Australia succeeded in metrication, but not US?

Cultural differences, I suppose–Australia probably hasn't gotten so suffused with the "greed is good" mentality that's been the order of the day in the US since the 1980s.

Why do you care what the temperature is reported in in a country you don't live in? I can't say I've looked up the temperatures in other countries all that often (probably my most frequent instance of doing that is seeing what the weather is like in Ukraine since it would affect the war there). And considering that private apps like Ventusky exist that give you the weather in whatever units you would like, for anywhere in the world, why does it matter for your purposes what NWS does?

[J N Winkler]

Aren't weed-out courses supposed to be merely difficult rather than impossible?  They're not much use if literally everyone fails.

Regarding the exam question the professor couldn't solve, that situation was resolved much as Kkt suggests--it was simply left out when the tests were graded.  Since it was a timed test, that disadvantaged students who spent time on it at the expense of other questions.

This particular problem was clearly inspired by the 1990's Sprint pin-drop commercial and was deceptively simple.  Given a pin dropped in a vacuum onto a flat surface from height h at angle θ, how much longer after the lower end hits does the other touch the surface?

Clarkson's weed-out courses mainly consisted of the freshmen Calculus, Chemistry, and Physics classes, since most people (outside of business majors) had those in common.  Still, while the tests and a few of the homework problems were difficult, they were all doable by people who paid attention in class, did the work, studied hard, and had an aptitude for science/engineering.  They also had plenty of time for people to get help if needed between office hours for the professors and TAs.  I suspect the intro Computer Science classes were used as this for the Digital Arts and Science majors, but I found them fairly easy, so it's hard to say for sure.

I Googled after I posted and it seems the definition of a weed-out course is pretty capacious.  For many, the archetype is much as you outline:  a freshman course designed to redirect those without the preparation, aptitude, or motivation to persist in a high-demand major, and yes, that stereotypically includes freshman calculus (especially for accounting and business majors), introductory computer science (for non-CS majors), and organic chemistry (for pre-med).  But a weed-out course can also be one specific to a given major that is not encountered until distribution requirements and initial prerequisites are cleared, and is often taught by an instructor considered difficult--for my physics degree, this was Mechanics I.

To an extent, weed-out courses (to either aspect of the definition) are an expression of the philosophy of "Spare the rod, spoil the child."  Over the past few decades, I suspect the incentives have changed to favor gentler means of redirection as student debt has become more prevalent, college degrees have come to be regarded more as a consumer product, and the survival of departments (and sometimes whole colleges) have increasingly become tied to graduation rates.  Especially with the attenuation of tenure, it is now much more likely that an instructor will lose his or her job for making a weed-out course unreasonably difficult, as happened last year with Maitland Jones at NYU.

Read this article. Australia went from similar situation as US to almost complete metrication in the 1970s. Could US do the same in next 20 years? I would like that to happen.

It wasn't just Australia--it was pretty much every major country in the settler Commonwealth, including Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa.  (India, not a settler country, metricated about a decade earlier.)  I suspect the transition carried through to completion in those countries, while it stalled in the US, because (1) the public sector allocated (and continues to allocate) a higher proportion of GDP in those countries, which gives civil servants more leverage to enforce metric mandates, and (2) possibly also their respective industrial bases were much smaller on a per-capita basis than that of the US, thereby lessening the switching costs.

Even so, it has already been noted in this very thread that metrication has been culturally skin-deep in some sectors in those countries, the continuing use of imperial units for lumber in Canada being one example.  I am sure you could find similar examples in Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand.

[lordsutch]

EDIT: The 1970s is when we attempted to switch. There could have been a big push by the oil companies to switch to liters to avoid adding an extra digit to the prices. Why didn't they?

Anecodotally my recollection is that was part of the problem; there was pushback that metrication would be used to hide inflation, much like in Britain and Ireland there was concern that decimalizing the pound would be used for stealth price increases in the same general time period.

Not to wade too deeply into the politics here but as a general rule American political institutions are structured to favor the status quo, even more so than the political institutions of most countries; if you're going to change something that already exists and mostly works, you need a really compelling case to effect change and there has never been that compelling a case for metrication in the consumer space given the size and influence of the American market. It's one thing if you're a relatively small country surrounded by countries that all have been metric for decades and mostly trade with them, quite another if you have the world's largest or second-largest economy and can make other countries and global corporations put up with your idiosyncrasies to do business with you, especially if the costs are low.