Seen at the globo yesterday

[Jared Ashley]

Originally Posted by Daniel Frankel

So a furlong = 200m




Rod = 5m



Chain = 20m

I have never heard of any of these units of measurement.

That's because you're from Canada, where they use a rational system of measurement.

Actually, nobody in the US uses them either, but you can find the conversions in the back of a lot of notebooks, calenders, and such.

And for the record, a fortnight is generally 14 days.

[Craig Rogers]

Originally Posted by Jared Ashley

That's because you're from Canada, where they use a rational system of measurement.

Actually, nobody in the US uses them either, but you can find the conversions in the back of a lot of notebooks, calenders, and such.

And for the record, a fortnight is generally 14 days.

The metric system is the tool of the devil. My car gets 40 Rods to the Hogshead and that's the way we like it. - Abe Simpson

[Jared Ashley]

Originally Posted by Craig Rogers

The metric system is the tool of the devil. My car gets 40 Rods to the Hogshead and that's the way we like it. - Abe Simpson

Well played, sir!

[Greg Pellegrini]

Whoever came up with English system of measurement was stoned out of his god-damn mind.

5280 feet to a mile? 12 inches to a foot? 16 ounces to a lb? 8 cups to a gallon?

Metric is a lot easier to remember and conceptualize. Which is easier to visualize: one liter or 61 cubic inches? I wish the US would convert to metric so I wouldn't have to covert units when dealing with international data.

[Daniel Frankel]

Originally Posted by Greg Pellegrini

Whoever came up with English system of measurement was stoned out of his god-damn mind.

5280 feet to a mile? 12 inches to a foot? 16 ounces to a lb? 8 cups to a gallon?

Metric is a lot easier to remember and conceptualize. Which is easier to visualize: one liter or 61 cubic inches? I wish the US would convert to metric so I wouldn't have to covert units when dealing with international data.

Personally, I don't understand time measurement. Everything revolves around 60's and 12's. I heard somewhere about a timing system used somewhere a long time ago where the day was split into 10 "hours" of 100 "minutes" of 100 "seconds". I was never able to find info about it again, but I think it would make everything a hell of a lot easier.

[Robert D Taylor Jr]

Originally Posted by John McCord

Sounds like a lot of Sailor nonsense.

None of those terms have a nautical origin. You're thinking of fathom, six feet(approximately) or Nautical Mile 2000 yards (this is equivalent to a minute on latitude roughly)

Landlubber.

[Stu Christensen]

Originally Posted by Greg Pellegrini

Whoever came up with English system of measurement was stoned out of his god-damn mind.

5280 feet to a mile? 12 inches to a foot? 16 ounces to a lb? 8 cups to a gallon?

Metric is a lot easier to remember and conceptualize. Which is easier to visualize: one liter or 61 cubic inches? I wish the US would convert to metric so I wouldn't have to covert units when dealing with international data.

It's 16 cups to a gallon lol

[Jared Ashley]

Originally Posted by Greg Pellegrini

I wish the US would convert to metric so I wouldn't have to covert units when dealing with international data.

You and every other american with a shred of scientific background.

The good news is in the real world (or at least in aviation) even america only sort of uses the english system. Yeah, everythings measured in inches, but that's it. If something's 400 inches long we just say it's 400 inches, not 33 feet, 4 inches. And no absurd fractions like 17/32", we'd just say 0.531 inches... once you do that it makes most of the stupidity of the system go away since the base unit length is arbitrary anyway.

The bad news is all the machines and tolerances were designed in inches, and you can't change tolerances arbitrarily because it affects the manufacturing process, which is not an option. So while in theory you could convert specs from inches to centimeters, it results in some really confusing tolerances like +/- 0.25 mm instead of 0.01 inches (usually they just call it +/- 0.3, but it's still less intuitive).

[/rant]

[Shane Steinert-Threlkeld]

Wow. Bicep curls (empty bar) on THIS:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wP8T-j9IzJ4
I didn't even know they existed

[Jon Gregory]

OK so the Haka is a scary little war dance. Whoopy do. Check out the English version.....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZjLATAUwao