Should the United States adopt the Metric System of measurements?

Question

Nearly every other major country in the world uses it as the primary system of measurements of distance, volume, temperature, energy, etc. It is comparatively simple to make conversions in the Metric System as the system was designed for making conversions.

While I am a conservative in nearly all issues, I align with many supposed liberals who favor adoption of the Metric System, both to better align ourselves with the rest of the civilized world and to improve our measurement system.

It will greatly simplify life for school children when they have only to learn that a kilometer is 1000 meters instead of learning that a mile is 5280 feet.

So why don't we do it?

Answer 1

For everyday use it does not matter much. If you grow up with either system, you have a feeling how much a pint or a liter is. But, as soon as you start doing science, engineering, or any related field, the metric system is definitely better.

As an illustration, try to solve this problem:

If a car weights 1250 kg, how much power do you need to accelerate it to 30 m/s in 6 seconds?

Solution: 1250 * (30)^2 / 2 / 6 = 93750 W = 93.75 kW

(this is approximately 127.5 HP)

Easy, no?

For comparison, try to solve this:

If a car weights 2850 pound, how much power (HP!) do you need to accelerate it to 60 MPH in 7 seconds?

The metric system would not only simplify life for school children, it will also simplify it for scientist and engineers, making their computations less error prone and, consequently, the products better and cheaper.

So why don't you (the US) adopt it? In my opinion, it's because you'd need federal government regulations concerning this, and Americans are more afraid of federal government regulations than of trans fats, Al-Qaeda and the President's adultery combined.

Answer 2

Liberia and Burma. Along with the USA, these are the only nations relying solely on archaic weights and measures. The rest of us use the sensible system. Here in the UK goods in shops are sold in metric measurements, but with Imperial conversions for those who cling to pounds and ounces and can't get their heads around the simpler system. The metric system must be used by law. Petrol and diesel is priced in litres, not gallons. Road signs indicate distances in miles still, though this should eventually die out, as schoolchildren have been learning the favoured metric system for some 30 years now. Beer in pubs is still served by the pint (which is not the same size as a US pint - it has 4 extra fluid ounces, and is equivalent to 568 ml)

Answer 3

They should adopt the metric system so we could all speak the same language.
But...
UK has adopted the metric system in 1971.
We are, I believe, in 2006. They have had enough time to switch to metric, but, although they teach it at school, they still use yards, inches, pounds (which, funny enough, has the same pronunciation and spelling than the "other" pound, leading to many confusions: "Give me a pound of beef" is not the same as "Give me (for) a Pound of beef").
So, if the Brits have not been able to adapt yet, after 35 years, how do you expect Americans to manage it????
That is why everybody else is learning to speak English. If we did not, how would we speak to them (both Brits and Americans)?
Actually, the only reasonable people I know are airline pilots, the FAA and the CAA: they have adopted English as THE mandatory language. Think of a pilot flying from north Russia to Marocco: he would have to speak 21 languages to be understood by the traffic controls...
BTW: the aircraft that crash landed several years ago, near Winnipeg, ran out of fuel because "someone" (pilot, loaders and others) could not use metric and make conversions...

Answer 4

America should completely adopt the metric system. As an engineer, having to convert between english and metric units is one of the most annoying things in the world. Especially because the English unit system has to be the most counter-intuitive, utterly useless system of measurement ever devised.

Go grams, meters, kilos, decis, and everything else that is beautiful about the metric system!

Answer 5

Of course you shouldn't. It would give the rest of us one less thing to laugh at you for. I mean, not only are you not metric, you don't even have a standard pint! And your paper size is so funky. Anyway, doing all the hard conversions keeps you on your toes (except google will do it for you now).

Answer 6

Yes, for sure. I am a South African and we have adopted it many many years ago. The problem if they don't, is that confusion arise when projects in conjunction with other countries are performed. A couple of years ago, this was the reason for a multi billion dollar failure with the Mars space probe.

Answer 7

My answer is, NO WAY!

1) The metric system was designed at the beginning of the 19th century, and to my mind, is about as scientific as some of the more way out statements of pyramidologists.
2) The imperial system was designed by ordinary people, to meet ordinary people's needs. (A lot of metric measures are too big, or too small to be comfortable for everyday use.)
3) The imperial system is not just a way of measuring things, it's a part of your culture. It's a good part of your culture.
4) If you want minor mistakes, use the imperial system, if you want real clusters, use the metric system. Because the measurements are not intuitive (see above), and because it's harder to remember which way the decimal point is supposed to be heading off, people can make REALLY serious mistakes (lethal in some circumstances) with metric measurements. (I still work out what is going to happen to the decimal point by thinking back to the imperial system: e.g. 36" in a yard, so to convert yards to inches, I multiply, so to convert metres to centimetres, I multiply by 100.)
5) Children learn their maths (especially fractions and arithmetic in other bases than 10) better if they already know the imperial system.
6) No one knows what a hectare is. No one knows when they announce on the news that the robber was 65 cm tall if he's a dwarf, or it someome stuffed the conversion, or ??? Do you know how tall other people are in metric?
7) People sound like dickheads saying, "The flames leapt metres into the air," or suchlike. It sounds so much more natural and sensible to say "The flames leapt yards into the air."
8) People used to say, when it was being introduced here (Australia), that "It was easier for computers." This is triple balderdash. (a) it is the job of machines to serve people, and not vice versa, (b) computers use base 2, not base 10, and (c) all you have to do is program the machine to work in imperial measurements.
9) Dividing an imperial recipe into thirds or quarters is easy. Dividing a metric recipe into thirds is virtually impossible.
10) 10 is divisible by 2 & 5, 12, is divisible by 2, 3, 4 & 6 - looks like a lot more options to me.

So, I would say to the citizens of the United States, "No, you don't want to go metric."

Answer 8

As I see it, there are three major reasons for not using the metric system. First, most Americans have the standard system ingrained in them, making a transition more difficult. Second, it is a pride factor. Would you rather say that you are 6'2", or 2m? Third, the women. The metric equivalent to the single pound is approximately 4 Newtons, so a 125 lb. woman would weigh about 500 Newtons, and women don't want to weigh 500 of anything.

Answer 9

That's a good question & yes it would conform to the majority. It would be confusing at first, but in Canada we survived it & are very adept at using both methods.

Answer 10

We should, but it's basically a back-burner issue for Congress. There's enough anti-metric sentiment for them to not touch it for a while.