Units of Measurement

[Toby Frost]

Where's the Warpug?

With Mu'ad D'og, fighting the forces of House Barkonnen and the Pugishah Emperor.

 

[Danny McG]

It's gotta be some journalist interviewing an astronomer, but he can't mentally envisage a size.
"So how big is it again Prof?"
*Sigh* "Do you know how big a giraffe is?"
"Er - not quite sure Prof, is one bigger than a car?"
*Sigh again* "Ok, how about a pug dog? Or Taylor Swift?"

 

[Toby Frost]

How many pugs are there in a Taylor Swift? Or Taylor Swifts in a giraffe? Is the giraffe upright or folded up? I have a mental image of a dinosaur in the late Cretaceous looking up and thinking "Uhoh, that's a lot of pug dogs and it's coming our way..."

 

[Harpo]

I googled, and this came up. Somebody photoshopped Taylor Swift’s album covers

Size: CDs are about five to a pug, LPs maybe two per pug.

 

[Harpo]

Oh sorry, you want that in giraffes?

 

[Cthulhu.Science]

Apologies if we had this one already

View attachment 117274

Did they say which giraffe in the article?

 

[Harpo]

Did they say which giraffe in the article?

The middle half

 

[Wayne Mack]

So how cold is a Three Dog Night?

 

[Harpo]

So how cold is a Three Dog Night?

Cold As You

Taylor Swift – Cold as You

“Cold as You” is the fifth track of Swift’s debut album and details her experience with an emotionally unavailable guy. Unlike Shakespeare who compares his lover to a summer’s day

genius.com

 

[ThomasThompsonActual]

instead of necroing an old thread...

If if read a futuristic sci-fi and the author uses imperial
--if the story was wrote in the 90s or later, I assume the author doesn't know much science. Probably an unfair assumption, yet one that happens nonetheless. It is a stumbling block and if I were to hit another one or two blocks right off, I would discard the book.
Basically if the story involves off Earth by human tech it should be metric imo. Science uses metric, NASA uses metric, imperial causes rockets to get lost. It requires me to suspend my disbelief when I encounter imperial here. (of course some authors produce their own units with great success)

If it was steam punk in the USA I would expect imperial.

Someone once told me that if you want to focus a story on the impersonal universe, or the coldness of technology, use the Metric system. On the other hand, if you want a story to be about the natural world, personal feelings, or emotions use Imperial instead. Her example was temperature differences: "There are only 20 degrees each between 0°C, 20°C, and 40°C but there is a huge difference in how that feels to people."

 

[ThomasThompsonActual]

Perhaps a slab???

So how cold is a Three Dog Night?

Cold enough that you need all three dogs in the bed with you to warm it up!

 

[AllanR]

the natural world

What is often considered 'natural' is merely what one grew up with. All she would do is confuse people who only use metric.

 

[Swank]

Hard to respect any science fiction that uses a measurement system tied to one planet's size, gravity and sea level pressure. Metric is so parochial.

 

[ColGray]

My favorite unit of measure is a smoot. If someone claims they're writing hard scifi and uses a different unit of measure, it takes me right out of the narrative.

Smoot - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Dave]

So, is one Smoot = one Taylor Swift = three Pugs = half a Car = a third of a Giraffe?

This is too confusing. No wonder people started using imaginary lengths of chain instead.

 

[farntfar]

Now let's get scientific about this. Because One Taylor Swift is longer than a Smoot by approximately 142857.682 wavelengths of sky blue pink light in a vacuum.

 

[Alex The G and T]

New, giant tomb discovered in China. Apparently 280 football fields (presumably American football) Equal Three Vatican cities.

"The gigantic burial complex — dubbed Wuwangdun — spans just over 16 million square feet, roughly the size of 280 football fields or triple the size of Vatican City.

 

[Cthulhu.Science]

New, giant tomb discovered in China. Apparently 280 football fields (presumably American football) Equal Three Vatican cities.

"The gigantic burial complex — dubbed Wuwangdun — spans just over 16 million square feet, roughly the size of 280 football fields or triple the size of Vatican City.

Fun fact: American Football fields and Fifa Football pitches are approximately the same size. Close enough to the same for measuring tombs or Vatican Cities.

 

[Harpo]

New, giant tomb discovered in China. Apparently 280 football fields (presumably American football) Equal Three Vatican cities.

"The gigantic burial complex — dubbed Wuwangdun — spans just over 16 million square feet, roughly the size of 280 football fields or triple the size of Vatican City.

And we know that Vatican City is bigger than a Blue Whale

 

[Alex The G and T]

Fun fact: American Football fields and Fifa Football pitches are approximately the same size. Close enough to the same for measuring tombs or Vatican Cities.

Thanks for clearing that up. I was wondering.