• brsrklf
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    1 个月前

    For scientific purposes, any system would be kinda hard to reestablish, without a definition that everyone agrees upon and a way to measure it accurately. The imperial system does not provide that definition at all.

    For everyday purposes… what kind of apocalypse would result in the complete destruction of all of the world’s measuring tape?

    • FelixCress@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 个月前

      what kind of apocalypse would result in the complete destruction of all of the world’s measuring tape?

      The Empire Strikes Back apocalypse 🤣

    • morriscox@lemmy.world
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      1 个月前

      For example, I can tell someone that the length between their knuckles of their index finger is about an inch or that a foot is literally based on the length of the human foot without having to have a ruler present. The metric system has no easy references. The history of the Imperial system is messy but it works (mostly) as a way to do rough measurements until the accuracy needed for the metric system is present. After that, the metric system makes conversions really easy, including getting rid of lot of units, and makes more sense.

      Once you have the needed accuracy, the Imperial system is inferior to the metric system and should be phased out.

        • morriscox@lemmy.world
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          1 个月前

          Yup. One would start with that and then (hopefully) agree on a standard that is hopefully metric.

            • JcbAzPx@lemmy.world
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              29 天前

              If we’re knocked back to reinventing measurements we’ll probably reinvent the cubit along with the foot. If you’re building something by yourself you don’t need to be universally consistent, just internally so.

          • robobobot@programming.dev
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            1 个月前

            Yup. One would start with that

            One would start measuring one meter using three feet, you mean? Until we can establish an exact measurement of one meter?