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Do you use Metric or Imperial measurements?
This week, after a lifetime of unwavering loyalty to Metric, I dug in - & now my mind’s blown. Now I get why folk cling to Imperial.
(And also why Napoleon was taller than he’s given credit for.)
Get comfy. It’s a long one.
(1/)
This week, after a lifetime of unwavering loyalty to Metric, I dug in - & now my mind’s blown. Now I get why folk cling to Imperial.
(And also why Napoleon was taller than he’s given credit for.)
Get comfy. It’s a long one.
(1/)
First, let’s call Metric what it was: a sensible act of revolutionary rationalism.
Europe before the French Revolution was a pig's ear of measurement systems: at least 250,000 (!) in France alone. Every region of every country used something a bit different.
Carnage.
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Europe before the French Revolution was a pig's ear of measurement systems: at least 250,000 (!) in France alone. Every region of every country used something a bit different.
Carnage.
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This new system, first proposed in 1790, would rely on unchanging laws of Nature, the kind that everyone could agree upon.
Good plan, right?
Yes and no. First they had to measure Nature with late 18thC technology - and that proved *maddeningly* hard.
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Good plan, right?
Yes and no. First they had to measure Nature with late 18thC technology - and that proved *maddeningly* hard.
(3/)
