this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2024
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There is a reason. When you grow up with people around you using imperial units to describe things, you think in terms of it. If you tell me 10 ft., I can picture that in my head, I have an idea of how much that is in real terms. If you tell me 10m, I have no mental idea of how much that is, even if I can convert it. It’s like a language you grow up speaking, versus one you learn later in life.
I do think metric the sole system used in schools, to be honest.
That's true, but it's also a double edged sword: you can easily learn metric just by switching to it.
Try setting a weather widget on your phone to only show you Celsius and don't convert it to Fahrenheit, over time you will get an intuitive understanding of what feels cold to you.
The biggest block to learning a new system is insulating yourself with conversions IMO, imagine trying to learn a new language by just having everyone speak into Google translate
That’s a good idea that I think I will try out. To be honest, I have a pretty hard time visualizing distance, even with imperial, so sadly I don’t think that help will help me in that area.
It’s weird, because small units I think about it cm, not imperial.
I'm the same actually, I'm probably more likely to say 1cm than half an inch
Millimeters as well for you? It’s probably because having to use fractions is so much less intuitive.
Millimeters especially, no way am I saying like "1/24th of an inch"