http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... -back.html

I mean if you're gonna get a nasty bug...

Teach metric only in schools and within a few generations imperial will pass away. If you try to push it to the sidelines there will be more resistance.

Who buys their petrol in gallons then? What's that, no-one?

Much a-do about nothing, a measure is a measure. I use Celsius for temperature, but feet, inches and miles for distance/lenth measurement. It's really not a problem, and since both systems are legal for use anyone who tries to foist one system on people over another is an idiot who should be hanged from the 0.91 metre arm.


It probably won't work, I was taught metric exclusively at school, but I still inherited the use of feet, inches, miles, stones etc from my parents and grandparents.

I use metric for distances/lengths below 1 metre, then imperial above that.

Aye, same here.

At use I use metric for everything at home, except:
Miles for long distances (as all our road signs are in miles)
Pints: drinks in the pub and buying milk.

At work almost everything is imperial. An expected side effect of the oil industry starting in America.

I use whichever system fits the context.

Most of the time I'll use metric I.e. Distances for running/cycling, weights small and large, volumes of liquids, speed when not in a car, etc...

The only imperial measurements I use are long distances for driving (due to road signs), speed when driving, and pints at the pub.

I've often wondered how Americans (I've met some who literally have no idea what 1kg or 1km is) can do physics and mechanical equations using newtons laws? Do they have to have crazy conversions to make them all work?

Give it another 10 years and all the people who "care" will be dead anyway and it won't matter.

Another nonsense story from the DM. The so-called metric martyr did not fall foul of EU law but of UK law. When the UK joined the EEC, as it was back then, the UK Government, under Ted Heath, passed a law saying they would convert to the metric system within 30 years. The 'metric martyr' was prosecuted for failing to adhere to a UK law which wasn't a prerequisite of joining the EEC but a voluntary one set by Westminster.

But that doesn't make a good story for the DM, demonising Brussels is much more fun.

When I saw the title I wondered what Emperor Palpatine was up to now.

Yes and one reason they lost a satellite recently because of problems converting imperial to metric.

Funnily enough, Newton did.

Jon

It’s ingrained in the language. I tend to use “inches” and “feet” as a vague indication of size or distance simply because that’s what my parents did when I was a child.

I measure properly in metric.

I buy cheese by the pound, milk by the pint, yet Coke and petrol by the litre. I'll switch from millimeters to centimeters to inches to feet to meters...

Kids today are only taught metric in school, I certainly never learnt imperial measurements, I had to learn that from my parents...And it was a case of having to learn, or not know exactly how far 300 feet would be to the next traffic light, or knowing what a pint of milk looked like...

Cooking is a good one, I have one or two cake and beer recipes which I've cobbled together, so one minute it's saying add a gallon of water, the next it's saying add a kilo of sugar, then it says something else...

The weirdest one for me is temperature. I can roughly convert lengths, weights volumes etc in my head. But I have no concept when comparing temperatures.
I know what's hot and cold in c for the weather, and I know what's hold and cold for drilling fluid in F. But I have no idea how the numbers compare. If you told me the weather was going to be 63f tomorrow I wouldn't have a clue what that meant. If you told me the mud was 63 f, I'd know that was stone cold by mud standards.