As an engineering and physics major, I deal with units. A lot of units. In fact, even the upper level courses of both fields cover units on the first day, and continuously throughout the semester. This is irritating enough seeing as I’ve been studying units since elementary school science, but today – the day I am writing this – I have my first day of class in four different engineering courses. I am learning the same thing over and over again, and I almost shot myself in the foot after the first lecture about units. I know, I really know, some people need the review and units are ridiculously important in both fields, but honestly, if you don’t know the basic units of length, volume, time, temperature, mass, etc., you might be in the wrong class.
I am not here to complain despite Leo telling me that’s the purpose of a blog. I am here to tell you that the United States, Liberia, and Myanmar lacking some serious common sense. Yes, I am saying using the Metric System is common sense.
I am a HUGE advocate of the Metric System (also know as SI or the International System of Units). I love the Metric System so much, that when covering the other two systems in class today (British Gravitational and English Engineering System for those of you wondering), I considered moving to France and studying engineering there so I can use the Metric System. For your information, my engineering courses use BG and ESS units, unlike my absolutely beautiful SI-using physics courses. Now I do understand the purpose of teaching BG and EES in engineering courses (it’s more applicable towards future work experiences in the United States, so learning how to use it in courses are more beneficial to most graduating engineering students), but – and I may just be a true physicist – BG and EES will never be favorable to me. It seems idiotic and unnecessary, and I would pay/petition/sacrifice a finger for the United States to switch systems.
Here are my reasons why the Metric System is better:
1. Base 10. 
Within the Metric System, units of measurement for different dimensions differ by bases of tens. For example, a meter is the basic unit. If you wanted to measure something smaller than that, you can divide meter by ten to get decimeter, divide again to get centimeter, and again to get millimeter. In BG and ESS, feet are pretty much the basic unit. To get something smaller, we can go down to inches which you divide feet by 12. To get something larger, we can multiply feet by 3 and get yards. Might be a little confusing using text, but wouldn’t you rather know that every conversion is either multiplying or dividing by 10 than remember 3 feet go into a yard or 12 inches into a foot.
2. The basic units are based on scientific measurements, not some dude’s foot.
Not to go after anyone’s foot, but using a foot is a stupid measurement. I read somewhere it was based on the British King’s foot size, which is if the case, he has a ridiculously small foot. Many ancient civilizations used a foot to measure, but the length of a foot changed with every other country and city (most likely depending on the ruler’s size of foot, I believe). In 1959, a foot was officially defined. I hate the idea of the length of someone’s foot being universal measure. It’s kind of conceited where as a meter was scientifically found. In 1668, John Wilkens, a English cleric and philosopher, wrote an essay saying that meter should be an universal measurement, and the length of the meter would be the length of a pendulum with a half period of a second. (I like to point out how Wilkens came up with an universal length in 1668, and the foot wasn’t universal defined until 1959.)
Also in EES, and this is just an irritation of mine, mass and force have the same basic unit. The only difference is adding the dimension after the unit, so mass is in units of pound-mass (lbm), and force is in units of pound-force (lbf). Really. Does that seem logical at all? And to convert lbm and lbf to BG, you have to divide by the gravitational constant g(sub c) which is 32.174. That constant has units, but the units reduce to nothing (not uncommon).
3. Most of the names of units are based on associating scientists.
This was kind of a shot in the dark (I personally like this because I like knowing the research used to come up with concepts, and physical 
concepts usually came with units. So….if you ever want to know what a Newton was, you can look at Sir Issac Newton’s research and find out) but in the Metric System, if an unit isn’t based on a Latin word, it’s most likely based on a scientist. Examples: Newton, Tesla, Ampere, etc.
For a more specific example: Nikola Tesla, my own personal favorite scientist/engineer, the man who did, at least, as much as Thomas Edison for the field of electricity, if not more. He was the man who came up with AC current. The Tesla unit is used for magnetic flux density, which is associated with electromagnetic fields. Electromagnetic fields are created by moving an electric charge, which can be done using a magnet. Science you would learn if we had units named after scientists in BG or EES.
4. Internationally recognized, and used in all countries except the United States, Liberia, and Myanmar.
This is logical in it itself. If you were ordering something for South Korea or China, you probably have to know the Metric System. This has caused an issue in many industries especially considering how we get a lot of supplies and products from overseas now. Hypothetically if we started now, switching systems, teaching kids the Metric system from the start, they wouldn’t have to worry about that in the future. We do, and this is why we have problems.
Also, I like to point out the fact that physicists get slightly irritated with BG and EES system. Physicists, like industry, deal with a lot of international information. Journals get printed out every single month with research from all over the world. If we were to keep using BG and EES in our field, it wouldn’t be a good form of communication to the rest of the world who uses Metric, and sharing of information is important because many discoveries have occurred from the combination of research. Many problems arise from the bad communication all the time, and having different unit systems only increase the chance of problems.
The Metric System is easily the more logical – and cooler – system, and the US uses it in some aspects like measure power (kWhr, kiloWatt-Hourswhich is stupid by the way) and wattage (W, Watts). It might have some disadvantages, but for the general public, the Metric System is easier. Thank you France for coming up with something more logical and actually contributing something to society.
NESCIO 