"Dave Smith" > wrote:
> I beg to differ with you nieces. The metric system is not harder than the
> Imperial system, which makes little sense to most people who swear by it. I
> am always prepared for people who claim it is better than metric, just ask
> them how many pints are in a gallon, how many gils in a pint, how many
> yards in a furlong, how many square rods in an acre. Metric is much easy
> to deal with.

I don't think is was so much a question of metric itself being harder but that
having to convert and make the adjustment to the new system was harder (than not
doing it). They are several years older now and both preparing for careers
involving science or engineering, so I think they have a different opinion at
this point.

> We have been metric in Canada for thirty years now and it works. Soft
> drinks come in the same size cans as in the US, but the contents are listed
> as 355 ml instead of 12 oz. The only problem with metric for most people is
> that that they spend too much time trying to convert it to Imperial instead
> of just learning to think metric. It is like learning a second language.
> When you start off you spend a lot of energy translating everything from
> one language to another. Once you become fluent you stop translating to
> yourself.

I can't say I'm completely used to metric, but that's because I still have to
deal with Imperial measurements for most things in daily life. I was first
exposed to metric when I was about 12 years old (around 1965) when I got very
interested in foreign cars and got several car books from Europe with all the
specs in metric. Later I got a degree in engineering. So metric is quite
ingrained in my mind. I've got the constants 2.54 and 454 imprinted in my mind
just as strongly as 3.14. Then there's the approximations that come naturally: a
quart and a liter, a meter and a yard, a pound and half a kilogram, a mile and
two kilometers. So I can get a rough feel for things very quickly.

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