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SYSK Selects: Why isn't the U.S. on the metric system? · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Hey everyone, it's me Josh, and this week for s
0:04
Speaker 1: Y s K Selects, I've picked why isn't the US
0:07
Speaker 1: on the metric system? The big spoiler is this kind
0:10
Speaker 1: of is, so check it out. Welcome to stuff you
0:18
Speaker 1: should know room House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and
0:27
Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W.
0:31
Speaker 1: Chuck Bryant and since we're together and there's some microphones present,
0:34
Speaker 1: and Jerry's in the other room, this is stuff that's right. Yeah,
0:38
Speaker 1: I learned musty, dusty little whole. I'm glad to be
0:42
Speaker 1: back in this room. Actually me too, because we did
0:44
Speaker 1: these in another room for a little while. Again just
0:47
Speaker 1: moving us around. Yeah, like we're like, we don't have
0:50
Speaker 1: a process or something. Yeah. They what they do is
0:52
Speaker 1: they tie a yarn around one of the microphones and
0:55
Speaker 1: they just sort of drag it through the building and
0:57
Speaker 1: we just chase after it like a little dumb puppy. Yeah.
1:00
Speaker 1: It works with dollar bills to dollar bills and microphones.
1:04
Speaker 1: So you're doing okay, I am sleepy. Well that's good
1:08
Speaker 1: because we'll see what happens when I might put you
1:10
Speaker 1: all the way to sleep. I was up all night Um, yeah,
1:13
Speaker 1: this is gonna be fun. Are you hallucinating at all?
1:15
Speaker 1: I'm a little funky, So yeah, this should be good numbers.
1:19
Speaker 1: This is history though, really, yes, it is more than history.
1:22
Speaker 1: Culture anger. Yeah, Napoleon for god's sakes. Yeah, yeah, we're
1:28
Speaker 1: talking about the metric system. Hey, hey, that makes sense
1:32
Speaker 1: to say that. Um, you chuck. We've got like this
1:35
Speaker 1: kind of meme that's run through our podcast where we
1:40
Speaker 1: kind of make fun of the metric system, and but
1:43
Speaker 1: we also go to the trouble of calling out the
1:45
Speaker 1: metric equivalence of whatever we're talking about with feet. Usually
1:49
Speaker 1: sometimes we're sort of it like, if we feel like
1:51
Speaker 1: doing it, we'll do it. Yes, but we've done it
1:54
Speaker 1: enough so it's become a thing. Yeah, right, the metric
1:56
Speaker 1: system and US has become a thing. I thought it
1:58
Speaker 1: was high time that we got to the bottom of
2:01
Speaker 1: this whole big problem, which is the US is the
2:05
Speaker 1: only industrialized nation that isn't on the metric system right
2:10
Speaker 1: fully on the metric system as a nation. You did
2:13
Speaker 1: a great job with that, man. That is absolutely true. Like,
2:17
Speaker 1: we're the only industrialization that doesn't have compulsory metric system usage.
2:23
Speaker 1: It's voluntary, but it's still pretty widespread. And if you
2:26
Speaker 1: go back and look at our lawbooks, you know, the
2:29
Speaker 1: law of the land, you will find that the metric
2:32
Speaker 1: system is very much entrenched in the US. And so
2:35
Speaker 1: all these people who say the US is on the
2:37
Speaker 1: metric system, you're wrong largely. Yeah, look at your ruler
2:41
Speaker 1: there in your little three ring binder probably says centimeters
2:44
Speaker 1: and millimeters. That's metric. Uh right, But that's if you're
2:49
Speaker 1: in the U s. If you're if you're elsewhere outside
2:52
Speaker 1: the US, they just have centimeters and millimeters. They don't
2:55
Speaker 1: throw the engine there. The inches so clean, that would
2:57
Speaker 1: love the inch. It is clean and it is a
2:59
Speaker 1: rep resents this legacy from so long ago when you know,
3:03
Speaker 1: people used the width of a human man's thumb as
3:07
Speaker 1: a measurement and that was an inch. And apparently there's
3:09
Speaker 1: some languages out there where inch and thumb or the
3:12
Speaker 1: same word, they're interchangeable. Yeah. I wondered about if you know,
3:15
Speaker 1: obviously the article points out in the early days, like
3:18
Speaker 1: you said, they would use body parts like you know,
3:21
Speaker 1: what was the wouldn't like a formalm palma a foot
3:24
Speaker 1: is what you think it is? Yeah, like people that
3:27
Speaker 1: had smaller of these did they get ripped off in transactions? Slightly?
3:31
Speaker 1: Like I had a small thumb, like what are we
3:33
Speaker 1: gonna do? Right? Or do you bring along your buddy?
3:35
Speaker 1: Do you hire the guy with the big thumbs be
3:37
Speaker 1: like you're working for me? And transactions that's what they
3:40
Speaker 1: call the master blaster technique. That's where the heavy hitter
3:44
Speaker 1: came from. But yeah, so there's a certain kind of um,
3:47
Speaker 1: earthy colloquialism to the to the the US customary system,
3:52
Speaker 1: which is what we use the inch, the foot, an
3:55
Speaker 1: acre and acre did you know is the average amount
3:58
Speaker 1: of land that a human with the team of oxen
4:01
Speaker 1: could plow in a day. That's where we got the
4:03
Speaker 1: acre from. It's cool, it all makes sense that it's root.
4:06
Speaker 1: The problem is it's extraordinarily unscientific. Um, yeah, true, which
4:13
Speaker 1: is what the meter is. These the metric system is
4:18
Speaker 1: extremely scientific, but it's got its roots, um, fairly far
4:23
Speaker 1: back itself. It goes back to like sixteen seventy. Should
4:26
Speaker 1: we get into this. Let's let's talk about this. That's
4:29
Speaker 1: a great robust intro. You're feeling good? Yeah, okay, good? Thanks? Alright, So,
4:34
Speaker 1: like we said for many many years, as man evolved
4:38
Speaker 1: in two smaller societies and two bigger and bigger ones.
4:42
Speaker 1: The thumb and the foot and the forearm and things
4:44
Speaker 1: like that. Was like, it's getting a little a little
4:46
Speaker 1: crazy to handle all this, right, especially if you're using
4:49
Speaker 1: a forum over here, but this guy's using a neck
4:52
Speaker 1: and you both have swords. So as we formed larger societies,
4:59
Speaker 1: we thought, you know, is getting really confusing. We got
5:02
Speaker 1: commerce going between various lands. We gotta like codify this,
5:07
Speaker 1: right or do you say codify? I say codify? How
5:11
Speaker 1: you do good? Um? Well we agree on pronunciations. So
5:16
Speaker 1: in France things were just as confusing. And by the
5:20
Speaker 1: time the French Revolution came around, they said, you know
5:23
Speaker 1: what everything is all wha I could do. Charlemagne here
5:27
Speaker 1: has had a pretty good system in effect for a while.
5:29
Speaker 1: Let's just dive into this system that Paris uses. Well, yeah,
5:33
Speaker 1: the problem is is um. Paris Is wasn't any more
5:37
Speaker 1: um scientific than anybody else's. But it was Paris. It
5:41
Speaker 1: was um and that was I think Louis the sixte
5:45
Speaker 1: that ordered some people to start looking into how to
5:48
Speaker 1: standardize measurements because France had it worse than anybody. Well, yeah,
5:51
Speaker 1: because they they they thought it was a good idea,
5:53
Speaker 1: but he got more pushedback than he thought from the
5:57
Speaker 1: noble folk, and so so much so that they overthrew him. Yeah,
6:01
Speaker 1: and he said, well yeah, and he said, you know what,
6:03
Speaker 1: let's convene here the Estates General, which was supposedly a
6:06
Speaker 1: group of UH, an assembly of people from various classes
6:12
Speaker 1: to be all represented, and let's figure this out once
6:14
Speaker 1: and for all. UH. And again they overthrew the king.
6:18
Speaker 1: But along the way they also adopted us a systematized
6:22
Speaker 1: standard of measurements which is based on this um, this
6:25
Speaker 1: stuff devised by a monk back in sixteen seventy Mouton. Well,
6:31
Speaker 1: matrique was the system, right, but matrique um comes from
6:35
Speaker 1: the Greek, which means um to measure right, that's right. Um.
6:39
Speaker 1: So Muton came up with this idea that you should
6:42
Speaker 1: um take you should be able to create a standard
6:48
Speaker 1: unit of distance of length based on something that has
6:52
Speaker 1: to do with the earth. To take it away from
6:54
Speaker 1: the humans. Humans come in all shapes and sizes. You
6:57
Speaker 1: need something that's going to be persist tint. And let's
7:01
Speaker 1: say say I persistent, like not only is it always there,
7:06
Speaker 1: it's in your face too. So he was saying, let's
7:09
Speaker 1: let's use some sort of measure of a degree of longitude, right, yeah,
7:13
Speaker 1: which makes sense because that what had already been established. Yeah.
7:16
Speaker 1: So he kind of put this fourth heel said, and
7:18
Speaker 1: by the way, you should you should make it up
7:19
Speaker 1: based on a decimal system, very smart a UM ten
7:24
Speaker 1: ten base system base ten system um, which is very
7:28
Speaker 1: easy to divide and multiply by. And um, it's not arbitrary, right,
7:33
Speaker 1: and base it all around this length like everything like volume, mass,
7:36
Speaker 1: all this stuff. Make sure it's around this one length
7:39
Speaker 1: and um. He went and died, but his ideas lived on.
7:43
Speaker 1: And so when the National Assembly really started to look
7:48
Speaker 1: into this system of measurement, they found, um, Mouton's ideas
7:52
Speaker 1: were alive and well and pretty practical. Yeah, and they
7:55
Speaker 1: said let's do this. Um. And then they said, all right,
7:58
Speaker 1: if we're gonna do this, let's form a mission. Formed
8:00
Speaker 1: the commission and said, let's base it on these three
8:03
Speaker 1: principles that were established by Mouton, who I don't think
8:07
Speaker 1: we said it was a mathematician. Obviously here was a
8:09
Speaker 1: mathematician and astronomer, weren't they They kind of went hand
8:14
Speaker 1: in hand. They made beer yeah, exactly, which meant they
8:18
Speaker 1: are also mathematicians and astronomers. Um, so they had the
8:21
Speaker 1: three basic principles should be equal to a portion of
8:24
Speaker 1: the Earth's circumference, which is I get what they mean,
8:28
Speaker 1: but that would be any unit of length that's smaller
8:31
Speaker 1: than the Earth's or conference. Yeah, I get what they're saying, though,
8:35
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. Like anything, you could just
8:38
Speaker 1: arbitrarily pick any length and you could say it's based
8:41
Speaker 1: on the Earth's or conference. You could. But what they
8:44
Speaker 1: were saying was it has to be a portion measured
8:47
Speaker 1: off of an already extant like something we already know, right,
8:51
Speaker 1: take a portion of it could have been eighty miles, though,
8:54
Speaker 1: sure it could have been, but that would have made sense.
8:57
Speaker 1: I digress. Number two. Volume of mass you said would
9:00
Speaker 1: be derived from length. So everything's gonna be related to
9:03
Speaker 1: each other and you could figure it out mathematically, and um,
9:07
Speaker 1: everything's got to be multiplied or divided by ten if
9:10
Speaker 1: you want to get something smaller or larger a decimal system. Um.
9:15
Speaker 1: This is just brilliant genius stuff for a guy in
9:18
Speaker 1: sixteen seventy to be coming up with and for it
9:21
Speaker 1: not to have been adopted right away. Um. But the
9:23
Speaker 1: French when they really started looking at it, they figured out, okay,
9:26
Speaker 1: this is a pretty good system. We're gonna go with this. Uh.
9:28
Speaker 1: And those two guys started measuring from um Barcelona, Spain
9:33
Speaker 1: to dunk Kirk, northern France, and they measured along this
9:37
Speaker 1: one line and they came up with a quadrant of
9:40
Speaker 1: the circumference of the Earth, basically the this meridian that
9:45
Speaker 1: ran through Paris from the north pole to the equator,
9:50
Speaker 1: so it's a quarter of the circumference of the Earth.
9:53
Speaker 1: And they figured out that a meter could conceivably be
9:57
Speaker 1: a one ten million of that quadrant, So it's one
10:02
Speaker 1: ten million of the meridian that runs through Paris as
10:05
Speaker 1: it goes from the north pole to the equator. That's
10:08
Speaker 1: the fact of the show for me. That's a meter,
10:10
Speaker 1: and also the fact of the shows that they decided
10:13
Speaker 1: how to do it and to call it a meter.
10:15
Speaker 1: And then they went, well, I guess we need to
10:17
Speaker 1: figure out how long this thing is, right like I
10:20
Speaker 1: would have thought it would have been the other way around.
10:22
Speaker 1: But I guess it doesn't make sense. Like I said,
10:23
Speaker 1: it's arbitrary. Let's come up with a system and then
10:26
Speaker 1: say all right, that base unit of measurement, how long
10:29
Speaker 1: should that be? And it it also it's pretty nationalistic too.
10:33
Speaker 1: It's this meridian that runs through Paris, you know, So
10:36
Speaker 1: it's the metric system is an extremely French invention, that's right, um,
10:42
Speaker 1: which is kind of one of the reasons you can
10:44
Speaker 1: go back and say that the US doesn't have it. Um.
10:47
Speaker 1: It's also one of the reasons a lot of the
10:49
Speaker 1: world does have it because after the French Revolution, UM,
10:53
Speaker 1: Napoleon came to power, and Napoleon UM conquered a lot
10:58
Speaker 1: of lands, and he brought the metri system with them. Yeah.
11:01
Speaker 1: I mean at this point it was it was solid.
11:04
Speaker 1: I think it took five years for them to completely
11:06
Speaker 1: adopt it or officially adopt it. And once you had
11:11
Speaker 1: the meter in place, you had everything else because it
11:13
Speaker 1: was all based off the meter. So they're homing along
11:16
Speaker 1: and then, like you said, Napoleon says, I'm going to
11:19
Speaker 1: take the meter with me and conquer Europe, and now
11:24
Speaker 1: everyone all of a sudden is gaining traction the meter,
11:28
Speaker 1: and so across the pond. In the US. At about
11:32
Speaker 1: the same time, right the you, the federal government was like,
11:35
Speaker 1: you know what, we we need to you can't have
11:38
Speaker 1: a country without a uniform system of measurements and weights
11:42
Speaker 1: and all that, because the commerce that's the basis of
11:45
Speaker 1: this whole thing. Right. If you're just a little hunter
11:48
Speaker 1: gatherer band and you're getting your own food, you need
11:51
Speaker 1: virtually no measurements or weights or anything like that. If
11:55
Speaker 1: you start trading with another band you wanted to be fair,
11:58
Speaker 1: you suddenly need a system of measurements and white. And
12:00
Speaker 1: then as that trade increases more and more, the need
12:04
Speaker 1: for that system of measurements and waits to be uniform
12:06
Speaker 1: around the world increases tremendously, right, agreed. So the US
12:11
Speaker 1: assembles the colonies into states and says we need to
12:14
Speaker 1: have some sort of uniform system of measurements. So Thomas
12:17
Speaker 1: Jefferson was the first guy to pick that up, right,
12:20
Speaker 1: I mean it's in the Constitution. Yeah. Previous to that,
12:22
Speaker 1: they obviously, because they were came from England, they used
12:26
Speaker 1: the British standard um and the British imperial system, which
12:30
Speaker 1: was pretty antiquated. Yeah, but it still looks a lot
12:33
Speaker 1: like what we're using it today exactly. And like you said,
12:36
Speaker 1: they put it in the constitution. What was it, uh,
12:39
Speaker 1: Article one, Section eight and then t J said, you
12:44
Speaker 1: know what, I like this decimal system. I think it's
12:47
Speaker 1: a good idea. But that means we gotta send these
12:50
Speaker 1: dudes over to France and we gotta find out. They
12:54
Speaker 1: gotta bring out their meter stick and show it to us,
12:56
Speaker 1: and we gotta bring one back with us, and it's
12:59
Speaker 1: really expand So so let's just keep what we got
13:01
Speaker 1: for now. And can we trust the French? Do we
13:03
Speaker 1: need to have our own surveyors go make the same
13:06
Speaker 1: measurement and make sure that this isn't somehow like French centric,
13:09
Speaker 1: Franco centric, you know. Um, So he kind of backed
13:13
Speaker 1: off of the whole thing. There was also a big
13:15
Speaker 1: fear that, like once Napoleon uh died down, that there
13:19
Speaker 1: was gonna be a there was metric backlash. Yeah, that
13:23
Speaker 1: it was just kind of fallow the wayside. Maybe we
13:25
Speaker 1: should wait and see. Let's they thought it sort of
13:27
Speaker 1: like investing in Napoleon. You know, who wants to do that? Nobody? Nobody,
13:33
Speaker 1: um round About the same time, also, the French had
13:36
Speaker 1: supported the US during the Revolutionary War, and then after
13:41
Speaker 1: the Revolutionary War, the enemies um Great Britain and the
13:44
Speaker 1: United States established a treaty called Jay's Treaty in and
13:49
Speaker 1: basically it said, hey, let's let's chill out a little bit.
13:52
Speaker 1: Let's see if we can get along. We're gonna withdraw
13:55
Speaker 1: our troops from the Pacific Northwest. We the Brits, you
13:58
Speaker 1: Americans can start trading in the West. Standis And the
14:00
Speaker 1: French was like, what the heck? I thought we were
14:03
Speaker 1: in bed together? Yeah, so what's going on? So all
14:06
Speaker 1: of a sudden there's hostilities between the French and the Americans,
14:10
Speaker 1: so much so that when the French held this big
14:13
Speaker 1: metric extravagance that like debut it to the world. Yeah,
14:17
Speaker 1: it was pretty funny. I thought, what just you know,
14:20
Speaker 1: I mean, it was necessary, but it just I could
14:22
Speaker 1: picture Convention Center with like various styles of meter sticks
14:27
Speaker 1: and here it is. But the U S didn't get
14:31
Speaker 1: an invitation. Yeah, they get snubbed. So let's let's let's
14:34
Speaker 1: point that out again. The U S didn't get an
14:36
Speaker 1: invitation when France was like, the metric system works. We're
14:40
Speaker 1: going to introduce to the rest of the world. Everybody
14:42
Speaker 1: come adopt this, except for you guys, because we're mad
14:44
Speaker 1: at you. Yeah. So I guess the ultimate question that
14:47
Speaker 1: we're answering in a roundabout way over this whole podcast
14:50
Speaker 1: is why isn't the U S one of those countries
14:53
Speaker 1: chalk this up as one of the early reasons. Well,
14:56
Speaker 1: they didn't want us to, they didn't invite us. Yeah,
14:58
Speaker 1: he said, screw you, guys, we'll go Matrique. Can you
15:01
Speaker 1: do whatever you want with your little ruler right in
15:03
Speaker 1: the U S said we will, we will, guys, we're
15:06
Speaker 1: gonna By this time, I think eighteen twenty one, John
15:09
Speaker 1: Quincy Adams order to survey um of all of the
15:14
Speaker 1: the states and all the measurements and weights used in
15:17
Speaker 1: the States, and they he said, you know what, this
15:19
Speaker 1: is uniform enough. We're gonna stick with this. We're fine. Yeah,
15:22
Speaker 1: we don't need this frenchie invention. Paul Giamatti said, no, yeah,
15:27
Speaker 1: that was he. He was John Adams, right, yeah, okay. Um. However,
15:32
Speaker 1: as we said, the metric system throughout the rest of
15:34
Speaker 1: the world, despite the fact that Napoleon went by by,
15:37
Speaker 1: the metric system caught on enough and it wasn't just
15:40
Speaker 1: tied to him, and the US was like, man, you'rpe.
15:44
Speaker 1: You know, everyone has really gotten on this metric thing.
15:47
Speaker 1: We might have missed the boat a little bit. Uh,
15:50
Speaker 1: and is that a problem? So in eighteen sixty six, Uh,
15:55
Speaker 1: Andrew Johnson said, you know what I'm gonna I'm gonna
15:58
Speaker 1: sign into law that is lawful in the United States
16:00
Speaker 1: to employ the weights and measures of the metric system
16:03
Speaker 1: and all of our contracts and dealings and court proceedings
16:07
Speaker 1: like the government standard, right exactly. And he said, like,
16:11
Speaker 1: if somebody uses the metric system and a contract with you,
16:14
Speaker 1: that's that's legal now. So right there, the US just
16:18
Speaker 1: legally adopted the metric system. The big the big loophole
16:22
Speaker 1: was it's not compulsory right there, It's just if somebody
16:26
Speaker 1: wants to, it's legal, right, that's right, um, Which is
16:30
Speaker 1: kind of funny because that added to this already cluster
16:34
Speaker 1: of the U s customary system where there's like three
16:37
Speaker 1: different units. A lot of stuff are the same, they
16:41
Speaker 1: have the same name. There's nine different kinds of tons.
16:45
Speaker 1: Did you know that? There's the short ton, the which
16:48
Speaker 1: you never want to get your hands on if you're
16:49
Speaker 1: looking for a full ton, the displacement ton, the refrigeration ton,
16:54
Speaker 1: the nuclear ton, the registered ton, the metric ton, the
16:59
Speaker 1: essay ton, and a ton of coal equivalent, chuck, that's
17:02
Speaker 1: a ton of tons. It is, UM. But now the
17:07
Speaker 1: metric system has just kind of poked its head in
17:09
Speaker 1: under US law and it's now entrenched. It's made, it's made.
17:15
Speaker 1: It's first four A into the US. That's right. Flash
17:19
Speaker 1: forward another nine or ten years, eighteen seventy five, another
17:23
Speaker 1: special Assembly in Paris said we're gonna bring together seventeen
17:27
Speaker 1: nations and you know what, us, get your butt over here. Yeah,
17:31
Speaker 1: come on. They're like, all right, well, come come on,
17:33
Speaker 1: you don't be mad, and they said no. So they
17:38
Speaker 1: went over and UM signed the Treaty of the Meter,
17:42
Speaker 1: which is a real thing, set up the International Bureau
17:45
Speaker 1: of Weights and Measures UH and a General Conference on
17:48
Speaker 1: Weights and Measures to consider an adopt changes over the years.
17:52
Speaker 1: And also said, you know what, if we're gonna establish
17:54
Speaker 1: this meter, we need to set up a lab where
17:58
Speaker 1: they keep all this stuff in their official form in
18:02
Speaker 1: case I guess, I guess, like the seed vault, in
18:05
Speaker 1: case the world ever goes to pot. We got that
18:07
Speaker 1: meter stick in this in this closet here, right, And
18:10
Speaker 1: they actually did have a meter stick. It was the
18:13
Speaker 1: International Prototype Meter, so funny, and it was a it
18:19
Speaker 1: was had to do it though. This is the meter,
18:23
Speaker 1: and this is the one that all are measured from,
18:26
Speaker 1: and it's housed in this area, this um, this office
18:30
Speaker 1: in seven Yeah. I thought it was buried beneath the
18:33
Speaker 1: crypt in the catacombs of the Is it No, I'm
18:39
Speaker 1: just kidding um, because it seems like something the French
18:42
Speaker 1: would do with the media. Tom Hanks would have found
18:45
Speaker 1: it though. Um, oh, I got you. Yeah, uh so
18:48
Speaker 1: they did have that. They had the meter. They also
18:50
Speaker 1: had the International Prototype kilometer. Yea, the kilogram yeah, um,
18:58
Speaker 1: and that's made of already him and platinum's kept in
19:01
Speaker 1: an air tight jar and it is um the kilogram.
19:06
Speaker 1: Everything else is measured off of. So they make copies
19:08
Speaker 1: of all these and all the um. All the countries
19:11
Speaker 1: that ratified the Treaty of the Meter got copies of
19:14
Speaker 1: their own, and the US got their own in eight ninety.
19:17
Speaker 1: So the U S is going like metric crazy now,
19:20
Speaker 1: especially because of this guy named Mendel right uh t C.
19:24
Speaker 1: Menden Hall. Menden Hall. He was the Superintendent of Weights
19:27
Speaker 1: and Measures, and the menden Hall Order of three said,
19:32
Speaker 1: you know what, We're gonna establish our fundamental standards for
19:36
Speaker 1: LinkedIn mass on this these metric units, we'll call it
19:40
Speaker 1: a yard, but yard is Eventually they settled on uh
19:45
Speaker 1: point zero point nine, right, and a kilogram or a
19:50
Speaker 1: pound equals zero point four five three five nine two
19:56
Speaker 1: three seven kilograms. So think about this. This is huge
20:00
Speaker 1: TC men in Hall changed everything with this men in
20:03
Speaker 1: Hall order. We still use the the pound inch system,
20:10
Speaker 1: the U S customary system, but it's defined by the
20:13
Speaker 1: metric system, the s I system, right, I don't think
20:15
Speaker 1: we mentioned that yet. Well we haven't got they haven't
20:17
Speaker 1: changed it over that yet, they haven't changed their name.
20:19
Speaker 1: We're still in the metric system of this just gave
20:21
Speaker 1: it spoiler alert. But but think about that. That's that's huge.
20:24
Speaker 1: So it's kind of like, all right, everybody's talking here,
20:26
Speaker 1: but if you if you go beneath the surface just
20:28
Speaker 1: one more level. The US is operating on the metric system.
20:32
Speaker 1: That's that we define everything years to screw you rest
20:36
Speaker 1: of the world. We are on the metric system. We
20:38
Speaker 1: just call it. Right. So about this time, um, there's
20:42
Speaker 1: like this kind of metric fever that's sweeping the US,
20:45
Speaker 1: and then Men in Hall dies and it kind of
20:47
Speaker 1: dies with him. Metric fever might be overstating, then you
20:51
Speaker 1: know they were. There were pennants and t shirts all right.
20:55
Speaker 1: Um no, actually that didn't come until the seventies. But
20:58
Speaker 1: before so inn Hall dies metric fever kind of dies
21:02
Speaker 1: out a little bit. And then, um, part of that
21:05
Speaker 1: Treaty of the Meter, Chuck, was that, uh, there was
21:08
Speaker 1: a conference established, a conference on this metric system where
21:12
Speaker 1: they would meet and like adopt changes and measure things. Yeah.
21:16
Speaker 1: It was It's cool because they weren't like, this is
21:18
Speaker 1: a perfect system, it never needs to change. They figured
21:21
Speaker 1: out ways to improve it over the years, and in
21:23
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty huge change came down, um, where they stopped
21:28
Speaker 1: tying and defining the metric measures of the metric units
21:34
Speaker 1: of measure to the original things like the meridian timillion um.
21:40
Speaker 1: Instead they tied it to immutable laws of the universe
21:45
Speaker 1: that made it even more precise. Man. Yeah, and this
21:47
Speaker 1: was mainly done for because of science. Science demanded uh
21:53
Speaker 1: tighter and more refined system, right exactly. Um, So now
21:58
Speaker 1: a meter is no longer you're defined as one ten
22:01
Speaker 1: millionth of the meridian that runs through Paris as it
22:03
Speaker 1: travels from the north pole to the equator. A meter
22:07
Speaker 1: is the distance traveled by light in a vacuum and
22:10
Speaker 1: one two hundred nine nine million, seven hundred nine two thousand,
22:15
Speaker 1: four hundred fifty eight of a second, that's a meter, right,
22:19
Speaker 1: or they just say a meter is this thing and
22:21
Speaker 1: they hold out the meter stick. Well, they still have
22:24
Speaker 1: the kilogram. It's the mass of the International prototype kilograms.
22:27
Speaker 1: Still that is still that's the only one that's still
22:29
Speaker 1: tied to it. But like, um a second, that's another
22:34
Speaker 1: metrics standard that we use here in the US. You
22:37
Speaker 1: didn't notice. So the time it takes an atom of
22:39
Speaker 1: seas M one thirty three to vacillate nine billion, one
22:43
Speaker 1: nine two million, six hundred and thirty one thousand, seven
22:46
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy times between two hyperfine levels of its
22:49
Speaker 1: ground state, that's pretty good. So basically what they did
22:53
Speaker 1: was this the meter. It became even more scientific. The
22:56
Speaker 1: metric system became so scientific that they stopped calling at
22:59
Speaker 1: the metric system. They called it the the s I,
23:02
Speaker 1: the International standard. Right. Yea, they could have gone the
23:06
Speaker 1: other way, They could have gotten less scientific. It would
23:08
Speaker 1: have been more fun. And Nick, well that was the
23:10
Speaker 1: kind of the thing. And I think that it's like, yes,
23:12
Speaker 1: it helps science tremendously, but it also it's going further
23:17
Speaker 1: away from that customary stuff that we use here the
23:20
Speaker 1: thumb inch, you know. Now it's seas and one thirty
23:24
Speaker 1: three atoms vacillating and it it it's more scientific and
23:29
Speaker 1: it's less human. It's just more precise, which is good
23:33
Speaker 1: for everybody. It is. They also added a lot of
23:36
Speaker 1: um in nine instead of um just millimeters or meters
23:43
Speaker 1: or kilometers. They also added a lot more like prefixes,
23:47
Speaker 1: like nanometer. There's now a picometer, which is a trillionth
23:51
Speaker 1: of a meter. Yeah, so far, because a nanometer is
23:55
Speaker 1: a billionth of a meter chez. Yeah, alright, so we
24:00
Speaker 1: back to the U S. Yes, So nineteen sixty things changed.
24:02
Speaker 1: That's that's the point of all this. I'm sorry about that.
24:04
Speaker 1: That's great. Point was is like the meters is kind
24:07
Speaker 1: of there hanging out, and then bam they expanded and
24:10
Speaker 1: make it way more scientific. Comes back like Gangbusters, it does.
24:14
Speaker 1: And it took about close to fifty years from the
24:16
Speaker 1: time Mendenhall died in ninety four to nine seventy one,
24:21
Speaker 1: when the U S. National Bureau of Standards wrote a
24:23
Speaker 1: report called a Metric America and obviously I was born
24:28
Speaker 1: in seventy one, I remember that, but I remember the
24:30
Speaker 1: following ten years, which was the recommendation for the transition.
24:34
Speaker 1: He said, let's try to do this over the next decade.
24:36
Speaker 1: So I remember as a young child the big push.
24:38
Speaker 1: It was a very big deal. It's always in the news.
24:40
Speaker 1: We're going metric, We're going metric. Uh. Congress enacted the
24:45
Speaker 1: Metric Conversion Act in seventy five, but said, you know what,
24:48
Speaker 1: this ten year deadline should be voluntary. Again, still not compulsory,
24:56
Speaker 1: which is yet another reason why we didn't fully go metric.
25:00
Speaker 1: I guess they had their reasons, but they said, let's
25:03
Speaker 1: not make this a compulsory thing. It smelled pretty Canadian.
25:07
Speaker 1: I think I did it to Americans, and they're a
25:10
Speaker 1: lot of people resisted. So globalization increases, we're doing more
25:15
Speaker 1: and more business with more and more nations around the world.
25:19
Speaker 1: American companies found themselves, you know, maybe at a disadvantage
25:24
Speaker 1: or at least challenged to keep up because they're still
25:27
Speaker 1: converting things and trying to get their trade partners to
25:30
Speaker 1: convert or at least we'll do the math for you.
25:32
Speaker 1: But know that when you're getting pounds it's this much.
25:37
Speaker 1: I mean, you're you're packaging products, say in Arkansas, that
25:41
Speaker 1: are being sold in Florida, but they're also being sold
25:44
Speaker 1: in um kirk, right, and you need to have two
25:48
Speaker 1: different packaging. That's expensive and stupid. Yeah, that makes you
25:52
Speaker 1: less competitive globally, that's true. So this Metric Conversion Act,
25:59
Speaker 1: there were amendments bad saying, you know what, let's go
26:01
Speaker 1: ahead and call this that the preferred system of weights
26:04
Speaker 1: and measurements for trade and commerce. So we instill a
26:06
Speaker 1: little further along, a little inched further along, or millimeter
26:10
Speaker 1: further along. Okay, uh, And then the they said the
26:13
Speaker 1: federal agencies are gonna have to use this system for procurements,
26:17
Speaker 1: for grants for business by the end of nineteen nine two.
26:20
Speaker 1: It's going to be our government standard. But that loophole
26:25
Speaker 1: was still there. If you were not a government agency,
26:28
Speaker 1: it was up to your discretion whether you wanted to
26:30
Speaker 1: go metric or if your private business, it's up to you.
26:33
Speaker 1: You can still ship by the pound if you want, right.
26:35
Speaker 1: So uh that that whole thing came into effect by
26:39
Speaker 1: two and the U. S. Government was officially metric. Right. Yes, Um,
26:43
Speaker 1: it's some of the some industries in the US took
26:46
Speaker 1: the opportunity to go metric too, Like the pharmaceutical entry
26:49
Speaker 1: industry went hard metric, which means it went all metric.
26:54
Speaker 1: Um say, like the beverage industry went soft metric, sad,
27:00
Speaker 1: which is why you can see um fluid, ounces and
27:04
Speaker 1: millimeters right next to one another, living in harmony on
27:08
Speaker 1: your can of soda. That's right. Tools are metric, bicycles,
27:14
Speaker 1: tools are metric and standard though. Yeah, that's true, that's true.
27:18
Speaker 1: Very good point. Film remember that stuff. Yeah, film is metric.
27:23
Speaker 1: I hate saying was it's it still exists. Thirty five millimeter,
27:27
Speaker 1: seventy millimeter, eight millimeter, oh yeah, super sixteen my favorite
27:32
Speaker 1: sixteen millimeter. Uh and now, of course it saw just
27:36
Speaker 1: on a digital card SD card, there's no card. That
27:42
Speaker 1: was funny when we sidebar here. When we were shooting
27:45
Speaker 1: our TV show, there's a tradition in which when you
27:48
Speaker 1: shoot your hundredth roll of film, you pop some champagne
27:53
Speaker 1: on set, and we did that, and I was like,
27:55
Speaker 1: how do you know, Yeah, we're not shooting rolls of film.
28:00
Speaker 1: Apparently there's some conversion that camera guys know that this
28:03
Speaker 1: is the equivalent of our hunder throw the film. So
28:05
Speaker 1: I Lance the the camera operator here. Yes, it's okay, um, extraordinary, extraordinary.
28:11
Speaker 1: He he was explaining all this to me, but I
28:14
Speaker 1: didn't realize that he was saying, like, this isn't a
28:16
Speaker 1: metaphorical champagne thing, Like there's champagne in the other room,
28:20
Speaker 1: and go get some. Josh. I was like, oh, thanks
28:22
Speaker 1: for explaining, and like walked away. And then I see
28:24
Speaker 1: like everybody else kind of bust and I'm like, I
28:28
Speaker 1: didn't get any champagne. He didn't this whole product. No,
28:31
Speaker 1: I had no idea what metaphorical. I went off to
28:34
Speaker 1: my dressing room. Okay, it's like we're all standing around drinking.
28:38
Speaker 1: I had no idea that Lance was sweet about it.
28:42
Speaker 1: He was, But at the same time, I was like,
28:43
Speaker 1: why is Lance looking at me weird while I'm walking away?
28:47
Speaker 1: All right, So, as of now, some people estimate about
28:51
Speaker 1: of American manufactured products and companies have gone metric. Not
28:57
Speaker 1: too bad, but the public at large has still uh
29:02
Speaker 1: push back for a few reasons, costs being one of them.
29:06
Speaker 1: It's expensive to two change all these documents and change
29:11
Speaker 1: your company two over to metric. I think NASA said
29:14
Speaker 1: it would cost three and seventy million dollars to change
29:17
Speaker 1: all of our drawings and tens of thousands, I'm sorry,
29:21
Speaker 1: thousands of man hours just for the space shuttle. Yeah,
29:24
Speaker 1: and man, am I glad they didn't go to the
29:26
Speaker 1: trouble doing that. Ways. Uh So, money is one thing.
29:30
Speaker 1: You can't just jump to the Metric system overnight. But
29:32
Speaker 1: you can also make a case, if I may interrupt, chuck,
29:35
Speaker 1: that money can also be saved using NASA as an example.
29:40
Speaker 1: Also UM in NASA lost its Mars climate orbiter because
29:47
Speaker 1: the UM attitude control system was on our Imperial system,
29:53
Speaker 1: our US customary system, right inches that kind of thing,
29:58
Speaker 1: but the navigation says, the guiding the thing was on
30:02
Speaker 1: the Metric system or the SI system. That's where you
30:04
Speaker 1: gets screwed and there was a discrepancy and it flew
30:07
Speaker 1: too close to the planet, overheated and is now just
30:11
Speaker 1: a million dollar space jump. Wow, they couldn't figure that out.
30:15
Speaker 1: I thought they had probably I guess, or else they
30:18
Speaker 1: just didn't think of it, or I bet they thought
30:20
Speaker 1: of it. They was probably an error. Uh And the
30:24
Speaker 1: author of this article points out that stubbornness and individualism
30:29
Speaker 1: is another reason Americans haven't, especially if it's the French
30:32
Speaker 1: that are pushing pushing it on its right exactly. I
30:34
Speaker 1: don't know about that. UM A while, I don't know
30:37
Speaker 1: how it first came up whenever we talked about the
30:40
Speaker 1: metric system. But years ago when of um, somebody listens
30:43
Speaker 1: to us named Amy Wang sent in her her graduate
30:48
Speaker 1: thesis for design school and it's called a metrica. Do
30:52
Speaker 1: you remember that? I do remember that, so UM I
30:54
Speaker 1: looked it up again and apparently it was this whole
30:56
Speaker 1: thing of like basically putting metric ings into normal everyday
31:02
Speaker 1: things into metric terms. So like your your coffee mate,
31:05
Speaker 1: say this has this many mill leaders in it? Or
31:08
Speaker 1: a taxicab, you know the little signs they have on
31:11
Speaker 1: on the roof. I saw one where it's driving and
31:14
Speaker 1: it shows how fast it's going in kilometers per hour.
31:17
Speaker 1: So what do they any by standards? Little things to
31:19
Speaker 1: just slowly convert people to the idea. And this is
31:22
Speaker 1: something that the our thesis on like this is a
31:24
Speaker 1: proposal that we should try and do. Yeah, something like that.
31:28
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's going anywhere, but I think
31:30
Speaker 1: there's some validity to that as far as Americans go.
31:32
Speaker 1: You would have to. We don't like things being pushed
31:35
Speaker 1: on us, which is probably why they always made it
31:38
Speaker 1: up to you. Yeah, you know, yeah, either that or
31:42
Speaker 1: business interests were like, just take away that compulsory part
31:45
Speaker 1: and then just kind of sneak it in little by
31:47
Speaker 1: little over the years. Although is it a big dealing more? Yeah,
31:51
Speaker 1: I think ultimately like we can kiss the US customary
31:55
Speaker 1: system goodbye. You think? I think so sure? I mean, like,
31:58
Speaker 1: it's it's that whole globalization thing. And if the business
32:03
Speaker 1: interests were the ones holding it back before, then they're
32:07
Speaker 1: going to be the ones driving it now. They're like,
32:09
Speaker 1: let's just go to metric. It's gonna make everything way better.
32:12
Speaker 1: Did you ever see the deal with Minimir in Liberia?
32:15
Speaker 1: Why why they're the other two? No, Liberia, I imagine
32:18
Speaker 1: would be because it was originally a US callin that
32:20
Speaker 1: was about because of US. I don't know about me
32:23
Speaker 1: and r at all. I have no idea why they
32:25
Speaker 1: wouldn't be. Melomar's right, delicious, Yeah, let's see you get
32:29
Speaker 1: anything else. I've got nothing else. So the answer is check.
32:32
Speaker 1: The US is pretty much on the metric system. That's right.
32:36
Speaker 1: We got a lot of it, a lot of it. Okay,
32:39
Speaker 1: if you start looking around for things that have meters
32:42
Speaker 1: and middle leaders and leaders, you're gonna see a lot
32:44
Speaker 1: of it here. Just open your eyes, man, right If
32:48
Speaker 1: you want to know more about um the metric system,
32:52
Speaker 1: We've got a couple of things on the website about it,
32:54
Speaker 1: pretty interesting stuff. Just type metric system into the handy
32:57
Speaker 1: search part how stuff works dot com and uh, I
33:01
Speaker 1: said handy search partage means it's time for a listener
33:03
Speaker 1: mail cash Iman. We call this uh be inspired someone
33:08
Speaker 1: to do something different in their life. Okay, hey guys,
33:12
Speaker 1: I thought i'd never be writing in but I thought
33:14
Speaker 1: you should know this. I've been listening for a while.
33:16
Speaker 1: I love your podcast. Listen to him while I do
33:19
Speaker 1: my homework to make it a little less tedious. So
33:21
Speaker 1: I live an Anchorage, Alaska and go to high school there. Recently,
33:24
Speaker 1: I've been introduced to a certain program called Rotary. This program,
33:27
Speaker 1: among other things, since and receive students looking to study abroad.
33:31
Speaker 1: I would just like to say that you guys have
33:33
Speaker 1: really inspired me to participate in this program the next
33:36
Speaker 1: academic year. I was always so consumed with trying to
33:39
Speaker 1: be normal, even though I never really was such a
33:41
Speaker 1: common experience. I know been since I've started listening to
33:45
Speaker 1: your Guys podcast, I have come to realize how much
33:48
Speaker 1: I don't know and have to learn. Uh. I've had
33:50
Speaker 1: quite a time watching and listening to people who are smart, cultured,
33:52
Speaker 1: and eloquent, like John Stewart, for example, who I love,
33:57
Speaker 1: uh and you and I do too. I was consious
33:59
Speaker 1: that you're saying that was her, but it's us right
34:04
Speaker 1: where see? Like John? Stay okay, I want to speak
34:06
Speaker 1: to you guys share the same qualities. Wow, how about
34:10
Speaker 1: that we share qualities with John Stewart. I don't find
34:14
Speaker 1: you know alright. I love the idea of becoming a
34:16
Speaker 1: better person purely through the appreciation of knowledge. I'm hoping
34:20
Speaker 1: that my trip next year will be an eye opener
34:22
Speaker 1: since I live in such a cutoff environment up here
34:25
Speaker 1: in Alaska. How that I'm complaining. I also hope it
34:27
Speaker 1: will prepare me for going into the Peace Corps. It's
34:30
Speaker 1: a civil engineer, man, that's awesome. I probably would not
34:33
Speaker 1: have had the courage to sign up for this stuff
34:35
Speaker 1: myself and deliver abroad for a whole year if it
34:38
Speaker 1: wasn't for you guys in your podcast. I won't know
34:40
Speaker 1: where I'm going until December, or which language I'll have
34:43
Speaker 1: to learn. Some of the options are places like Brazil, Denmark, Finlin, Germany, Russia, Cool,
34:48
Speaker 1: South Africa, Thailand or Turkey. Those are all great. Turkey,
34:54
Speaker 1: You're not a Turkey fan. I'm just getting parts of Turkey.
34:56
Speaker 1: You're beautiful. I'm really glad that I am pushing myself.
34:59
Speaker 1: We that Turkish guy that wrote in remember after we
35:02
Speaker 1: bagged on Turkey and he sent the pictures like, what
35:04
Speaker 1: do you think of this? Yeah? Look at least topless speeches.
35:07
Speaker 1: Didn't you win something? Didn't you win? That is all? Oh?
35:11
Speaker 1: Maybe so did send to him? I can't remember. Yes
35:14
Speaker 1: we did, was the answer. Okay, I'm really glad that
35:17
Speaker 1: I'm pushing myself out of my comfort zone enough to
35:20
Speaker 1: do this. Guys, I'm so excited. Thank you very much.
35:22
Speaker 1: Maybe I'll send you a postcard while there. And that
35:24
Speaker 1: is from Sydney. That is fantastic, Sydney. We take full
35:28
Speaker 1: credit for pushing you to do this, so long as
35:30
Speaker 1: you have a triumphant and successful return if anything happens
35:34
Speaker 1: to have never heard of you, um, but congratulations on that.
35:39
Speaker 1: That's pretty awesome and huge and thanks for writing in
35:41
Speaker 1: and letting us know that, Um, let's see what do
35:44
Speaker 1: you got? I don't know. What are some other things
35:47
Speaker 1: that America has been stubborn about. Oh, that's a good one,
35:50
Speaker 1: chuck Man, that's a good one. Examples of American stubbornness.
35:55
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35:57
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35:59
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36:02
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36:05
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36:14
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