Metric/imperial

[p1t1o]

34 minutes ago, Darnok said:

I like in imperial is that it is trying to use different "systems" for different things IMO that is best way to improve scientific calculations

This is by far the worst thing about Imperial units...

[Darnok]

31 minutes ago, Tex_NL said:

Please do not take my posts out of context. π has NOTHING to do with any discussion between metric or imperial. It is on a completely other level. And I would also very much appreciate you not taking remarks made AGAINST your claim and try to contort them in a remark in favour of it.

Metric might make no sense for you but fortunately the majority of the world does not agree.

Science is not democracy.

2 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

This is by far the worst thing about Imperial units...

It is best and very natural approach.

[Azimech]

Whatever the motivation for this topic, it won't change anything. So arguing over it is a waste of energy, regardless if you're using 7.5 puckledrots or 837 piljatua brain cycles for it.

[Tex_NL]

5 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Science is not democracy.

It is best and very natural approach.

Who said science is democracy? Nobody did! Science is truth.

Imperial is not natural. It's a mush-mash of units that have little to no relation to one another.

[Bill Phil]

1 hour ago, Kertech said:

Metric is an attempt to make a system based upon "natural" scales, so a gram is a mL of water and fills a 1cm sided cube and takes 1 cal to heat it by 1 degree. The interantional standard for a metre is now based on the speed of light (the distance light will go in 1/299 792 458 of a second)

But that's all circular reasoning. The definition of a meter before then wasn't light speed based, ans then they changed th definition to fit the current length.

Want even more natural? How about 1 light second is the standard unit, yeah seconds aren't natural, but you could use one light half life of a certain element...

[peadar1987]

Darnok, you don't appear to be a scientist or to have any scientific background. You have never tried to work out something like the horsepower produced by a nuclear reactor of volume X cubic yards, with fuel energy density Y btu/tonne, whose density is given as Z lb/cubic inch. It is not pretty, and it will make you beg for the simplicity of the metric system.

As for using pi as a base for our calculations, have you ever tried to do maths with a non-integer base? Heck, have you even tried to count in a non-integer base? It would make paying for a loaf of bread and a litre of milk almost impossible without a calculator.

[p1t1o]

15 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Science is not democracy.

No, but it IS empirical. If 99% of world scientists think SI is the way to go, you had better have pages and pages and pages of support for an Imperial system, other than an unqualified statement of "It is best ".

 

On another note, the only benefit of having "natural" definitions is so that you can re-construct your standard if your prototypes become damaged. Neither Science nor the universe care if units, metric or otherwise, are "natural".

Edited February 17, 2016 by p1t1o

[Darnok]

2 minutes ago, peadar1987 said:

Darnok, you don't appear to be a scientist or to have any scientific background. You have never tried to work out something like the horsepower produced by a nuclear reactor of volume X cubic yards, with fuel energy density Y btu/tonne, whose density is given as Z lb/cubic inch. It is not pretty, and it will make you beg for the simplicity of the metric system.

As for using pi as a base for our calculations, have you ever tried to do maths with a non-integer base? Heck, have you even tried to count in a non-integer base? It would make paying for a loaf of bread and a litre of milk almost impossible without a calculator.

For counting we have 10-based system. I said in one post that 10-based system is mainly for every day common use. While you are trying to convert equation made for 10-based system into other numeric systems... that is plain wrong. For different (for example) non-integer base system you would need different equations. But narrow mind is narrow mind, what you read in school stays true for you forever.

[Bill Phil]

1 hour ago, Kertech said:

The second is the duration of 9 192 631 770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the cesium 133 atom.

 

 

Why Cesium-133 specifically? That's completely arbitrary. We could just as easily define it with a variable star frequency. It we could use a fraction of a half life.

[Darnok]

3 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

No, but it IS empirical. If 99% of world scientists think SI is the way to go, you had better have pages and pages and pages of support for an Imperial system, other than an unqualified statement of "It is best ".

 

On another note, the only benefit of having "natural" definitions is so that you can re-construct your standard if your prototypes become damaged. Neither Science nor the universe care if units, metric or otherwise, are "natural".

Using different numerical system would require use different equations... some could be simpler?

[Bill Phil]

1 hour ago, Tex_NL said:

Sure. Imperial has its uses. But science is not one of them.

If so, then how did apollo land on the moon?

[p1t1o]

10 minutes ago, Bill Phil said:

Why Cesium-133 specifically? That's completely arbitrary. We could just as easily define it with a variable star frequency. It we could use a fraction of a half life.

Of course its arbitrary! How could it not be? You could just as easily use those things you mentioned, turns out using caesium does the job pretty well though.

8 minutes ago, Bill Phil said:

If so, then how did apollo land on the moon?

Come on now, now you're just being difficult.

12 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Using different numerical system would require use different equations... some could be simpler?

Thats a HUGE assumption. Go away, re-derive some equation or other, using Imperial [or any other, for that matter] units, so that it comes back "simpler" and come back with it and you will find that you will get FAR more support and be treated FAR more seriously.

I'm not even sure that the suggestion makes sense, but I'm OPEN MINDED...

 

[Darnok]

4 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

Thats a HUGE assumption. Go away, re-derive some equation or other, using Imperial [or any other, for that matter] units, so that it comes back "simpler" and come back with it and you will find that you will get FAR more support and be treated FAR more seriously.

I'm not even sure that the suggestion makes sense, but I'm OPEN MINDED...

 

Science is based on assumptions

25 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

No, but it IS empirical. If 99% of world scientists think SI is the way to go, you had better have pages and pages and pages of support for an Imperial system, other than an unqualified statement of "It is best ".

 

On another note, the only benefit of having "natural" definitions is so that you can re-construct your standard if your prototypes become damaged. Neither Science nor the universe care if units, metric or otherwise, are "natural".

Sure, but laws of universe/nature works somehow... and those are not 10-based values as science shows it on every step.

[adsii1970]

I've followed this thread and have decided to add my two cents here...

My father was career military, and during the Cold War, I spent much of my childhood living in what was then the Federal Republic of Germany (or West Germany). I grew up learning both the Imperial standard and Metric and still use them quite interchangeably in my life. As @Tex_NL stated in his earlier post, it is all about what you grow up with and are accustomed to. One of the biggest resistors to change is demanding that someone adopt something new rather than trying to objectively convince them that change is in their best interests in the long run.

When we moved back to the states in the late 1980s, I finished my last year of high school and was placed in a Chemistry II class (this was the highest science this high school had; the one I went to in Germany had physics and was the class I was taking before we moved). At one point, the teacher called the entire class a bunch of hick morons because they (the rest of the class) was having problems with the Metric system. I'm just saying that when someone that does not know or regularly use the Metric system is belittled by those that do, the results you will get are NEVER the desired ones.

[p1t1o]

4 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Science is based on assumptions

Sure, but laws of universe/nature works somehow... and those are not 10-based values as science shows it on every step.

Ho-Hooooookaaaaaaay....

[Darnok]

2 hours ago, Kertech said:

299 792 458

Another thing why do you think speed of light is constant in vacuum?

What evidence do you have? Where were made experiments to prove it?

If we made experiments with speed of light on Earth, on Earth's orbit, outside of Earth SOI, on Mercury orbit, on Pluto orbit, outside Sun SOI, near star at least 50% larger than our Sun and... just in case outside of our galaxy SOI then I will accept that C=constant, but otherwise... what is your prove it really is constant? And I am not talking about calculation, I want evidence from experiments from different locations... because speed of light might be constant LOCALLY.

[Azimech]

29 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Science is based on assumptions

Sure, but laws of universe/nature works somehow... and those are not 10-based values as science shows it on every step.

 

 

 

assumption

əˈsʌm(p)ʃ(ə)n/

noun

noun: assumption; plural noun: assumptions; noun: Assumption

1. 1.

   a thing that is accepted as true or as certain to happen, without proof.

   "they made certain assumptions about the market"

   synonyms:

   supposition, presupposition, presumption, premise, belief, expectation, conjecture, speculation, surmise, guess, theory, hypothesis, postulation, conclusion, deduction, inference, thought, suspicion, notion, impression, fancy;

[Tex_NL]

7 minutes ago, Azimech said:

 

 

 

assumption

əˈsʌm(p)ʃ(ə)n/

noun

noun: assumption; plural noun: assumptions; noun: Assumption

1. 1.

   a thing that is accepted as true or as certain to happen, without proof.

   "they made certain assumptions about the market"

   synonyms:

   supposition, presupposition, presumption, premise, belief, expectation, conjecture, speculation, surmise, guess, theory, hypothesis, postulation, conclusion, deduction, inference, thought, suspicion, notion, impression, fancy;

Necessity is the mother of invention. Assumption is the mother of all mistakes

Edited February 17, 2016 by B787_300
edited to remove reference to curse word

[p1t1o]

4 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Another thing why do you think speed of light is constant in vacuum?

What evidence do you have? Where were made experiments to prove it?

If we made experiments with speed of light on Earth, on Earth's orbit, outside of Earth SOI, on Mercury orbit, on Pluto orbit, outside Sun SOI, near star at least 50% larger than our Sun and... just in case outside of our galaxy SOI then I will accept that C=constant, but otherwise... what is your prove it really is constant? And I am not talking about calculation, I want evidence from experiments from different locations... because speed of light might be constant LOCALLY.

Firstly, this was a discussion on the relative merits between metric and imperial units...and now we are on the fundamental properties of the universe and the nature of scientific philosophy and our place in reality as thinking beings...

 

Anyway...

 

For the love of god, you need to spend a good looooong time on google, the knowledge you seek exists. 

You, personally, do not require all of those measurements, you are mistaken.

 

[Temstar]

5 minutes ago, Darnok said:

What evidence do you have? Where were made experiments to prove it?

Yes, often, and repeatedly. It's this very experimental evidence that shattered the luminiferous aether theory. In fact this experimental evidence was tested so many times that it was iron clad before Einstein came up with Special Relativity.

In fact you could say Special Relativity was a model specifically created to fit the invariant light speed experimental evidence.

[Darnok]

8 minutes ago, Temstar said:

Yes, often, and repeatedly. It's this very experimental evidence that shattered the luminiferous aether theory. In fact this experimental evidence was tested so many times that it was iron clad before Einstein came up with Special Relativity.

In fact you could say Special Relativity was a model specifically created to fit the invariant light speed experimental evidence.

Many times, but not many and not very distant places... that is why locally it might be true. While globally not really.

As for metric system debate... it is one of its topic, sine science is trying to measure things like speed of light using equations made for 10-based system... but other numerical systems could gave more accurate results  but with different equations... that is why we can't change numerical system and equations without changing concepts that they were based on.

Edited February 17, 2016 by Darnok

[Azimech]

34 minutes ago, Darnok said:

Science is based on assumptions

 

So I assume you need proof where thousands of years of human civilization established fact in various diciplines, resulting in you reading this comment somewhere on the planet through a vast network of highly advanced machines ... somehow it sounds like you're thinking they're using arcane occult rituals and you're living in the mind of the Great Green Arkleseizure ready to sneeze out the Universe.

[Darnok]

9 minutes ago, Azimech said:

 

 

 

assumption

əˈsʌm(p)ʃ(ə)n/

noun

noun: assumption; plural noun: assumptions; noun: Assumption

1. 1.

   a thing that is accepted as true or as certain to happen, without proof.

   "they made certain assumptions about the market"

   synonyms:

   supposition, presupposition, presumption, premise, belief, expectation, conjecture, speculation, surmise, guess, theory, hypothesis, postulation, conclusion, deduction, inference, thought, suspicion, notion, impression, fancy;

It has many meanings, you pick what fits your way of thinking

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/assumption

belief as synonymous for assumption also works...

http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/assumption

Edited February 17, 2016 by Darnok

[Temstar]

One of the most fundamental assumption of physics is that the same physics apply everywhere throughout the universe. If it's proven repeatedly that speed of light in vacuum is invariant, that means it's been proven at many different point in Earth's orbit. But even then that's not the point - we always assuming that if a result is repeatable (in this case extremely repeatable), then it's repeatable everywhere in the universe given the same conditions.

If the assumption is that physical laws and facts can be different in different places we wouldn't have physics. Physicists can all quite now and something else more productive because physics no longer have predictive power.

[Azimech]

Just now, Darnok said:

It has many meanings, you pick what fits your way of thinking

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/assumption

I see a bald man in uniform hiding his face in his hand.