321 replies to this topic

[Manny]

I'm constantly reading the label and trying to convert in my head (427g = 1 lb).

Thought it was 454g = 1 lb. Sick and tired of buying 454 grams of coffee!

[Evening Star]

I don't often hear people talking Celsius..It's mostly Farenheit here but I am near the border
The further north you go I am sure the more you will hear Celsius


Almost 90 % of Canadians live within a few hours of the U.S so I'm sure the majority knows both

I've lived in Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto, Windsor, and Regina. Windsor is the ONLY Canadian place I've been in where people use Fahrenheit.

Edit: I actually enjoyed blowing people's minds by telling them how the crazy Windsorites liked to use Fahrenheit.

Edited by Evening Star, 25 February 2012 - 07:52 PM.

[Evening Star]

Yet y'all still like to order a pint at the pub ....

I think people still think in gallons too, though - as in 'gas is such and such per gallon.' Again, I believe they do in Britain, too.

I don't know anyone in Canada who's under 40 or so who thinks of gas in gallons. Even when I lived in the US, I always had to convert back to litres.

[Manny]

Yeah I don't think anybody really uses fahrenheit much. Celsius is easier to relate to.
However, fahrenheit is more accurate.

[Evening Star]

Yeah I don't think anybody really uses fahrenheit much. Celsius is easier to relate to.
However, fahrenheit is more accurate.

How so? Using smaller units doesn't make a system more accurate.

[Bryan]

No doubt, fahrenheit is a dumb system, switching to celsius was really easy. Temps in F don't even mean anything to me anymore. Someone could tell me 50-80-100, I'll have no idea what that even means.

Height and weight holdovers are weird. They are specifically limited to people. I can tell how tall I am in feet and inches, but if you tell me something is 300ft long, I really have no idea what that means.

Yet y'all still like to order a pint at the pub ....

A pint is just the name of the "big glass" to us. If you asked a Canadian how much it holds, they would start trying to estimate in ml.

think people still think in gallons too, though - as in 'gas is such and such per gallon.' Again, I believe they do in Britain, too.

I don't know anyone who thinks of gas prices in gallons. They are universally posted in litres. Litres /100 km does mess some people up, but that's because they not only changed two units of measure, they reversed the relationship.

Actually, as far as I've seen, ALL liquid measures in Canada are litres and ml, there has not been any holdover that I know of. I buy a 750ml bottle of rum, not a 24oz, for instance. There's no oz on any bottle of anything in my fridge or my liquor cabinet.

Didnt mean to say no kgs are shown, they are on the meat aisle (non-deli) but the dominant will be the price per lbs

???I've never seen ANY meat sold in lbs.??? Grams and kgs is universal, and it's so much easier to estimate!

[Evening Star]

Yeah, my experience is very similar to Bryan's.

[Manny]

How so? Using smaller units doesn't make a system more accurate.

It's more precise, when you have a digital controller that only displays integer units.

[Jack Weber]

How so? Using smaller units doesn't make a system more accurate.

Oh I beg to differ...

When I measure something millimetres,I can be far more accurate than a standard measuring tape that's based on 1/8th's of inches...

[bush_cheney2004]

No doubt, fahrenheit is a dumb system, switching to celsius was really easy. Temps in F don't even mean anything to me anymore. Someone could tell me 50-80-100, I'll have no idea what that even means.

Oh really? I'll bet you readily know the flashpoint of paper in Fahrenheit, not Celsius.

[Evening Star]

It's more precise, when you have a digital controller that only displays integer units.

Oh I beg to differ...

When I measure something millimetres,I can be far more accurate than a standard measuring tape that's based on 1/8th's of inches...

To be boringly anal, in both of these cases, it's the measuring tool that is more or less accurate, not the system itself, since any unit can be subdivided, right?

[WWWTT]

Everything is based on the number 10 and the movement of a decimal point.

This is misleading.

It would be more accurate to say that the metric system is based upon our numerical system(which incorporates the use and value of the numeral zero and the decimal system),the distance from the Earths equator to the North pole and the weight of water.

WWWTT

[Manny]

To be boringly anal, in both of these cases, it's the measuring tool that is more or less accurate, not the system itself, since any unit can be subdivided, right?

That's true, but since we are talking about scales, any temperature scale can describe a temperature. But there are different kinds of scales, ie. kelvin, celsius, fahrenheit but their actual usefulness in describing the temperature is different in certain circumstances. The point I was making is that the fahrenheit scale has a finer resolution. When we talk about the temperature in fahrenheit, we can say 71, 72, 73 degrees. Those are finer more subtle changes than if we say just "20, 21".

[Jack Weber]

To be boringly anal, in both of these cases, it's the measuring tool that is more or less accurate, not the system itself, since any unit can be subdivided, right?

Yeah....I can use micrometer's that measure in 10,000ths of inches...Very precise...

But when I'm working with a measuring tape in either system,metric is far more precise to the naked eye.

[WWWTT]

Construction measurements are still in feet and inches, although distance between cities and speed limits are almost always referred to in metric.

This aswell is misleading.

Many tradesman still use the imperial system of feet and inches.

But any signifigant projects are designed with metric and all the prints/shop drawings are in metric.In Ontario the building code requires that all engineerd drawings be in metric.

Any metric tape out there has both metric and Imperial which can be a little troublesome when trying to use your tape exclusively in either format but convenient for converting.(you can get tapes imperial only and imperial/metric,but I can't find a tape measure metric only)

WWWTT