A recent incident caused me to wonder whether our schools, far from helping to resolve the UK’s “two systems” muddle, are actually consolidating and perpetuating it.
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A fascinating new series from the BBC comes up to expectations. (Article contributed by Derek Pollard). (more…)
At the time of writing NASA scientists are eagerly awaiting the results of soil sampling from their latest Martian probe Phoenix. Crucial to that experiment is confirmation of the presence of water. That precious substance essential to all life both here on Earth and maybe elsewhere. It also plays a big part in shaping the world geologically and meteorologically both here and possibly on Mars. What more natural a substance to choose for defining a unit of mass as was the case originally with the metric system.
Accurate and consistent measurement is fundamental to modern life, and in few branches of human activity is it more important than in sport - including, of course, the Olympic Games. This is the message given by Andrew Wallard, the President of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) to mark World Metrology Day (article suggested by Martin Vlietstra).
The BBC have just published an article on their “On this day” series (15th February) about the year 1971 - the time of “D-Day” and the change to decimal currency from the old shillings and pence. A link to this article appears below. (Comment for Metric Views contributed by Phil Hall)
One objection to metrication that I often hear is that the imperial system is embedded in the English language. If we were to lose the old measurement system, we would lose a lot of our language with it, they say. Just how true is that? (Article contributed by David Brown)
MetricViews has come across an interesting letter in a newspaper published in Georgetown, Guyana.
Extracts are reprinted below (acknowledgements to Stabroek News http://www.stabroeknews.com/index.pl/article_letters?id=56535420). The UK authorities could learn from the determined approach to metric conversion adopted by this former British colony.
Philip Bladon of Redditch puts this question. He also asks which local authority is most supportive of metrication. The editors of Metric Views, however, have doubts about whether this would be a useful line of enquiry, and invite comment from readers.
UKMA’s Chairman received the following critical letter from a thoughtful correspondent (a student or teacher of physics). As it is better argued than most efforts from defenders of imperial measures, it was thought that it was worth publishing (slightly edited to conceal his identity) - together with Robin’s reply.
One of the claims sometimes made by defenders of imperial weights and measures is that they are “natural”. The metric system (they may say) is all very well for science and technical matters, but for everyday life imperial units like the foot conform to the human scale and are more natural – unlike the arbitrary metric unit, the metre. We examine this argument.