h a l f b a k e r y"Put it on a plate, son. You'll enjoy it more."
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To celebrate the USA's enthusiasm for Imperial measurements and ways of measuring things that are not used by the rest of the world, there should be a new unit, equal to about half a micrometre, which would be used for measuring very small things. The definition of this unit would be that it is equal
to the difference between the USA's two contradictory definitions of a foot (the "International Foot" and the "US Survey Foot").
RIP US Survey Foot (1959-2022j
https://www.nist.gov/pml/us-surveyfoot
[a1, Jan 25 2024]
XKCD reads HB?
https://xkcd.com/2888/
610nm closer to madness [a1, Jan 31 2024]
[link]
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(As [a1] points out, NIST are trying to ditch the Survey Foot; however it is still in several states' laws as the designated unit of measurement for surveying) |
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Calculations using values from a1's link yield a length of about 6.096 * 10^(-7) metres. Seems legit. |
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However, you need to give this unit an official name.
This needs to fit in with the other traditional length names, to whit:
league, mile, furlong, chain, rod, foot, link, inch (- but apparently not the barleycorn, as far as the US is concerned.) |
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Given that some of these units are approximately the same length as a readily-available (but variable in size) thing they name, you could use something with an equivalent size. And the name must have the advantage of being short and memorable, because that's really the only thing this system has going for it.
Bacteria are often about half a micrometre wide, so I suggest you name it the "bug". |
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// it is still in several states' laws// |
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Muttering "I'm not dead yet." |
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// you need to give this unit an official name // |
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Their gallon is different too. Having said that, I only use imperial measurements for everything. All of those 00000s confused my brain. |
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// their gallon is different too // |
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Even better - two completely different gallons! |
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- US gallon (US gal), defined as 231 cubic inches (exactly 3.785411784 L)
- US dry gallon ("usdrygal"), defined as 1/8 US bushel (exactly 4.40488377086 L). |
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The latter one's abbreviation "Usdrygal" sounds like wizardly character name in some halfbaked fantasy novel. |
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But what are those in cubic US Survey Feet? |
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How many decimal places do you want? And do you want the result in US or Imperial decimal places? |
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//as a fraction, of course// |
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I make it 3/4921250 metres. |
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