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Date:         Thu, 16 May 2002 10:35:41 -0400
Reply-To:     80 Westy Pokey <pokey@VANAGON.ORG>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         80 Westy Pokey <pokey@VANAGON.ORG>
Subject:      Re: Warning!!!  Check Your Speedometer - What a Sad, Sad Example
Comments: To: Andrew Grebneff <andrew.grebneff@STONEBOW.OTAGO.AC.NZ>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1

Is it arbitrary? It is the distance traveled by light in a

vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second so that it is always a

repeatable distace. Then again I dont know the reason why

they picked 1/299,792,458 of a second so I guess that is

arbitrary.

Thanks, Chris

---- Original message ---- >Date: Thu, 16 May 2002 20:42:48 +1200 >From: Andrew Grebneff

<andrew.grebneff@STONEBOW.OTAGO.AC.NZ>

>Subject: Re: Warning!!!  Check Your Speedometer - What a

Sad, Sad Example

>To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM > >>Reportedly, grade-school students spend a few days on

measurements, >>practicing moving the decimal place around. Once they grasp the ease >>of metric, they forget it. No conversions to do. Nothing.

Then they >>move on, while American students spend endless days (not) >>understanding how to convert inches to feet to yards to

miles to... > >Matric is the ONLY system which makes any sense. The meter

itself may >be arbitrary in length, but the other measures are all

based directly >on it. > >1000 microns = 1mm >1000mm = 1m >1000m = 1km > >It's all based on thousands, not hundreds. > >1000mm3 = 1cm3 (=1ml) >1000 cm3 (ml) = 1l >1000l = 1m3 > >Also: >10mm= 1cm >10cm = 1dm >10dm = 1m > >What could be more logical? I'm glad I began using metric

myself as a >kid, before Canada (where I lived then) metricated. I can't

remember, >nor do I care, how many feet or yards there are in a mile. And I use >maps a lot, being a paleontologist (of sorts), and often

need to work >distances out exactly. On the maps 2mm=50m. 20mm=1km. Easy. >-- >Andrew Grebneff >165 Evans St, Dunedin 9001, New Zealand ><andrew.grebneff@stonebow.otago.ac.nz> >Seashell, Macintosh, VW/Toyota van nut


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