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The most recent candidate under the DNC banner is Lincoln Chafee who interestingly, besides being the lone Republican (he switched parties) to vote against the Iraq war, is vehemently pro-metric system. I remember when I was a kid, the freeway signs for distance and speed were printed in both English and metric. Converting all those signs from miles to km (again) would cost money, but then, using the English measurement system costs money too, forever -- according to a random guy I googled up without putting any real effort into it because I'm not that interested in proving myself wrong (Paul Naughtin), somewhere between six billion and a trillion. There are without a doubt, critics who might call that somewhat of a wide margin but as one witty commenter noted: "It is probably impossible to give an upper bound on that, however I can give you a lower bound: 500 Million Dollars for the loss of the Mars Climate Orbiter by NASA".
Now, I'm neither a firm GOP nor DNC voter... but I'm tempted.
takyon: Former Governor of Rhode Island Lincoln Chafee joins a number of other candidates seeking a 2016 U.S. presidential nomination.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday June 07 2015, @12:49AM
How did that work? A second are a second, not?
Well there's another historic artifact. Why do we have 360° steps for one rotation. Instead of say 0.125 for 45° or just 1000 steps for one rotation. Though radians are also nice to use because then there's less worry when it comes to derive or la place etc.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday June 07 2015, @01:12AM
Actually, I believe those two are tied together somehow with navigation. Seconds, and degrees.
A second may be a second but only in the same way that a yard is a yard.
A second is a duration of time, and that period we choose to use is purely arbitrary, just as is the yard and the meter.
In later times we started using atomic clocks to specify a second in terms of so many vibrations of an atom or something, but still
the duration we chose to split time up into are purely arbitrary. Even days and years are relativistic and imprecise.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.