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Author Topic: Evolution of math in the USA  (Read 13214 times)
Draxas
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Re: Evolution of math in the USA
« Reply #90 on: October 21, 2009, 09:55:33 pm »

20 miles meaning 200km? That's really far to go without any directional cues.
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Lukipela
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Re: Evolution of math in the USA
« Reply #91 on: October 21, 2009, 10:22:46 pm »

20 miles meaning 200km? That's really far to go without any directional cues.

Yup. when I aksed them they just said that kilometres seem unnecessarily small. I guess your units really do mold the way you think.
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Evolution of math in the USA
« Reply #92 on: November 18, 2009, 09:00:12 pm »

To be honest, between all the wars and inbreeding of royal families, yeah, I kind of did think the English system was pretty universal. You learn something new every day.
Well, actually, the English system (or rather, the Imperial system) did achieve some measure of universality, due to the British Empire. But not as universal as the metric system. And America does not use the Imperial system – its weights are different, due to not having the stone, and its gallons are different. (Incidentally, the stone is the source of the long ton.)

Luckily, this is mostly unofficial; road signs and such are in km. Amusingly, the Swedish mile was 10 688 m until 1889, when the Metric system was introduced and the mile redefined as 10 km.
Wow, Swedish miles are long.
Surely there was supposed to be a decimal point there?
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Lukipela
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Re: Evolution of math in the USA
« Reply #93 on: November 18, 2009, 09:11:47 pm »

Surely there was supposed to be a decimal point there?

Nope, in modern terms the old Swedish mile was about 10½ kilometres. So they rounded it down to ten.
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Evolution of math in the USA
« Reply #94 on: November 19, 2009, 03:05:38 am »

...Oh, actually I see what you did there. You gave the old version in metres, but the new version in kilometres. Trying to confuse me, eh? Tongue
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