19 years ago - down the long straight of memory lane...

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:rofl:

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For @123sg shouldn’t that be Foster’s? :laughing:

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Might touch a raw nerve in Ireland with that one

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Only Three Countries in the World (Officially) Still Use the Imperial System

METRIC VS. IMPERIAL

by Katharina Buchholz, Jun 6, 2019

Ounces, inches, feet and Fahrenheit – to most people on Earth these measurement units are unfamiliar or a distant memory. Only three countries – the U.S., Liberia and Myanmar – still (mostly or officially) stick to the imperial system, which uses distances, weight, height or area measurements that can ultimately be traced back to body parts or everyday items. Other than in the metric system these units are not easily divisible in parts of hundreds or thousands and are therefore thought to be inferior to those in the metric system by some. Critics of the metric system which was created for easy reference accuse it of being arbitrary in return.
https://www.statista.com/chart/18300/countries-using-the-metric-or-the-imperial-system/

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Well it’s a both strange and interesting phenomenon. If one would want to see this in a larger cultural resp. historical context: at the moment I cannot give any examples but I already noticed a long time ago that some European developments, maybe we could say achievements, kind of never made it to the U.S., after the U.S. became independent. In some repect the U.S. is stuck in the 18th century, at least frommy Europeanperspective. Almost all other non European countries use the metric system because they had been European colonies. I think the metric system is closely linked to the French Revolution and the Enlightenment. Although the independence of the US is closely connected to the Enlightenment, important parts of the Enlightenment and many things that followed apparently were not adopted in the US.
On the other hand, from an American perspective, Europe may seem like stuck in the times before 1800. E.g. we have lots of buildings that are more than 200 years old.

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Yep, sorry. I guess no matter what beer name I mention, it’d touch a nerve somewhere.

Edit: I’m not much of a beer person. I now see that Guinness is Irish, not British. (Even though Diageo PLC, the company owning the brand, has its HQ in London.) Sorry about my ignorance.

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Yes, they inherited the metric system in many cases.

But for the US I think also the major factor is cost, direct and indirect, public / government, private and corporate. The expense of totally replacing the entire universe of measurement units with another would be staggeringly expensive, even to the level of becoming a matter of national security. Virtually all infrastructure is dependent and / or involved with units of measure and discarding then replacing everything would have a huge impact, economically and otherwise. Entire tooling foundations would have to be scrapped and replaced, virtually the entire retail sector would be rinsed out, retraining, software would have to be rewritten / modified, etc., etc., etc. – E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G. Literally every nut and bolt, every bottle and container… Can you imagine the ecological impact?

And I’m sure I’m just scratching the surface of the surface.

Anyway, for the record I’m not at all opposed to the metric system. I wholeheartedly agree it’s a better system. I’m just referring to the realities of 350+ million folks worth of ‘stuff’ in the US alone – virtually everything we use, buy, sell, consume, etc. – being eventually discarded and replaced. It’s not a simple nor quick thing. It would have to happen over a generation or three, I suspect.

I’ve heard some folks say (not here, BTW), “It’s only units of measurement… just change it!”. That’s naive… :confused:

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They could just print more money…solution for everything until it isn’t… :slight_smile: I keep waiting for the house of cards to fall. I feel like we all have our heads in the sand and I wonder how can it keep going the way it is … every year there is the threat of default and a shut down and the ultimate solution is to get permission to borrow more money… a model followed by too many individuals as well at least in the west with credit card debt at levels that I can’t even comprehend… the whole world seems to run on money that doesn’t exist… I just wonder what the tipping point is going to be…

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Yep…

The mantra for me and my wife has always been, “A credit card is a method to pay for something, not a means to afford something.” Maybe twice (or once?) in nearly 35 years have we carried a balance from one month to the next and then by specific intent. It was paid off the next month as intended.

But we’re getting waaaaay off topic… :slight_smile:

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That is true, and, IMO, another reason NOT to switch to it.

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Now, calm down, calm down :-)))))
You ought to enjoy that we have a standard, any kind of standard, whatever it might be. Just see what our Italian fratelli had to endure, not too long ago: Italian units of measurement - Wikipedia

Have fun!
Claes in Lund, Sweden

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That makes the monetary units in Harry Potter look completely rational :slight_smile:

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Boom! :facepunch: I am wondering why they even call it “debt”. There seems to be no intention or even thought of ever paying it back. I’m old enough to remember when people were aghast at a one trillion dollar national debt. It is currently more than $33 trillion and growing by the second.

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Slightly “improved” version.

road
road1577×1049 967 KB

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Good skills - well improved.
If accidentally hitting kangaroos or emus can seriously damage a car - I’d hate to hit one of those.

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I was wondering what the signs on the right were showing. Maybe a warning about kangaroos? So, I came up with the idea.

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@lphilpot did something similar, but the image begs for this edit :slight_smile:

crw_0006
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crw_0006.crw.xmp (17.7 KB)

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Hmmmm… wonder what’s making that shadow on the road? LOL :stuck_out_tongue: :laughing:

Nice edit! I think the over-saturated and slightly skewed colors fit well with the ‘historical’ nature of the shot itself.

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Guilty as charged! :smiley:
That was sloppy. For me the sign was distracting, but I did a rather sloppy retouch. :man_shrugging:

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I was just joking. I’ve made plenty of errors / oversights… Once while editing a photo of something I was wanting to sell, I decided to remove the distracting background and in the process accidentally removed part of the item itself. I noticed that after the for-sale ad was posted… :slight_smile:

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