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Technically the metric system is "the preferred system of weights and measures for United States trade and commerce" as per the Metric Conversion Act of 1975.
You're just also allowed to use lbs and feet and stuff and most people do.
- The versions of imperial measurements the US uses are even defined in terms of metric units, so they're less a completely separate measurement system these days and more just a weird facade on top of metric, even.
  
  Like PonyOS!
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- And in the sciences and drug dealing and the military, we use metric exclusively.
  But for some idiotic reason, construction engineers often use imperial units and I have no idea why. Like buildings are built in pounds and feet and stuff, with half inch bolts and 2x4 (ish) lumber and half inch plywood. It’s idiotic.
  
  I don't generally defend imperial, but feet and inches are actually really useful in construction. Base 12 is easily divisible by 2, 4, and 3. You often need to divide architectural elements in thirds.
  
  I was a welder for years and I have to disagree. Using millimeters is way easier than inches, mostly because decimals are faster and easier to use than fractions. And it's not that hard to divide 10 by 2, 3, or 4.
  
  As a former structural engineer who lived on a Jobber 5 all day, that's still pretty niche overall. Easier because it's what your used to maybe, but outweighed by situations where it's not. Try doing trig with fractions and then tell me imperial is better.
  
  Trig is literally the math where you start dividing a circle in fractions and doing the math in base 360.
  What the hell are you talking about?
  
  I'm talking about trig using feet and inches. You know, rise, run, slope... Have you ever used trig outside of school? I don't understand what you're confused about.
  
  right now i use it for waves and reflections. that's all fractions and degrees. before it was machining and tbh for me that was faster to go to the book for the answers than calculate everything out.
  truly trigonometry is a land of contrasts.
  
  4 1/2 inches divided into 2 is 2 1/4. Finding center with imperial on a tape measure is actuality faster than metric. (I use a tape with both while fabricating).
  Also (good) metric fasteners cost 50% more than imperial in the US. Unless it’s for a car, I don’t use metric to save money.
  
  That might be somewhat useful if it was consistently applied, which it is not.
  And it’s maybe useful for fractions, but how many feet are in a mile again? 5280? A square yard is what now… 1296 square inches?! Who the fuck is supposed to memorize all that?
  What’s a 1/4 square yard in square inches?
  That’s not easy, that’s putting the mental into mental arithmetic.
  
  Again people making me defend imperial, I think metric is better.
  I see this argument all the time, converting between these units is hard cause the numbers are weird. You have to stop thinking about imperial as a system, it's not. No one should convert miles to feet, they are not intended to measure on the same scale.
  None of the conversions are easy because imperial is just a random collection of units that were being used to measure different things.
  
  Yeah, no one should be able to make a quick sanity check for things that span multiple powers.
  "Hey Bob, we have 5000 of those 78 ft rails, that enough for the 100 mile railroad?"
  "What do I look like, a fucking calculator?"
  vs
  "Hallo Heinz, how mäny hecto-liter do ve kneed für 1000 0.5l bottles of Bier?"
  "20, boss."
  The amount of people going completely out of their way to die on their little cubic ft hill actually defending they're incapable of easily and consistenly calculating units is just utterly ridiculous. "Nobody should be doing this!!!1!"
  No, wait, the people in here telling people that "dozenal" is superior, but not realizing they're not using a "dozenal" system at all, they're just counting to twelve in decimal. Those are also making me question whether humans actually went to the moon...
  
  Keep putting those words in my mouth. I'm not dieing on any hill, just trying to provide some context about why imperial is so weird. I still think metric is better.
  You seem really upset about something that really doesn't matter that much, are you okay?
  
  Did I mention you specifically when I said „the amount of people…“? See.
  And if it doesn’t matter much to you, why do you keep commenting? Nobody’s „making“ you defend anything. Are you okay?
  
  You were replying to me...
  I'm just replying to people who respond. I had seen your argument about imperial measurements a lot and since that's really not an intended use case, if anything about imperial can really be called intended, I responded.
  I'm doing fine thanks for asking. If my responses are agitating you I can stop. I hope you have a great life!
  
  Yeah, I’m just replying to people who respond. Look, I’m not the one having issues here, you are the one who keeps responding to me. Just stay out of my inbox if I’m agitating you.
  
  Glad you aren't having issues. No agitation here. Have a great weekend!
  
  Modern 2x4s are 1½x3½ and rounded edges and nobody knows why.
  
  What do mean no one knows why? It's to use less lumber. Back when there was unlimited old growth timber they used true dimensions at the mill, even extra dimensional, I've seen 2x4's that are closer to 3x5.
  
  Finished 2x4s are smaller, but unfinished are true
  
  No they aren’t- they are allowed by their respective grading agencies to be scant of truly 2” x 4” because they are most often dried after sawing, which causes them to shrink.
  
  As an engineer it’s because the people building it complain if I draw in metric
  
  "Give me eight cups of cocaine, good sir!"
  
  There is tradition with buildings having measurements connected to the human body. It makes looking back at ancient ruins and cathedrals intriguing and people who learn that stuff want to hold onto it so it isn't lost knowledge.
- Screw that, we'll make them use Metric. BY FORCE!
  
  You are being democratized, please do not resist.
  
  *decimalized
  
  That’s no republic
  
  Yep, that's what Napoleon did...
  
  And basically every other country in the world.
  
  Vive l'empereur, then
  
  Amd yet metric time failed
  
  How do you plan to do that when each of us is issued an assault rifle at birth and our military is 20x bigger than the next closest military? In other words, bring it on!
- Regan also never bothered to reinstate Imperial standards at the bureau of weights and measures (because it would have cost a small fortune). So our units are officially defined by the their metric counterpart. Legally speaking an inch is 2.54 centimeters.
- Then that means it's the people who are stupid enough to follow a worse system?

465 comments