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Comic strip of a ghost and a person with the American flag pasted on the head. The ghost repeats “Boo!” in the first three panels without getting any reaction, but when it in the fourth panel says “kg, cm, km, °C” the American gets scared and screams “AHHHH!!!”.

Edit: fixed alt text

    • twei@feddit.de
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      11 months ago

      You forgot that only a good guy with a gun-safe filled with AR-15s can stop a bad guy with a glock

            • intrepid@lemmy.ca
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              11 months ago

              Least important it may be. But it is the most significant. This scheme follows the conventional scheme we follow while writing numbers - the most significant digit to the left and significance reducing as we move right.

              The advantage of YYYY-MM-DD becomes when you add time to it in ISO-8601 or RFC 3339 format: YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ss. All the digits are uniformly decreasing in significance from left to right.

              This becomes even more apparent if you are trying to sort by time - say, a stack of files, or datetime in a computer. Try doing this with any other scheme.

    • MisterFrog@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      As much as I vehemently dislike US customary units, MM/DD/YYYY is the USA’s greatest notation crime.

    • RushingSquirrel@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      This one wouldn’t make sense as they say dates as month day, year.
      To me, dates should always be written in international format: YYYY-MM-DD

      • neumast@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        $ 50

        Do you call this fifty dollars, or dollar fifty?

        Lots of stuff is written differently, than it is spoken. In case of the date it is weird, not to go from biggest to smallest or vice versa. I guess you are used to it now, but for me it would be the same as putting seconds before minutes or inches before feet.

      • happyhippo@feddit.it
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        11 months ago

        Depends on context, IMO did/mm/yyyy is the most natural when writing some text, but partial ISO yyyy-mm-dd is ideal for when naming files and directories, makes lexicographical ordering follow chronological order.

      • _TheThunderWolf_@lemm.ee
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        11 months ago

        I personally prefer dd-mm-yyyy because cutting stuff of the end to get dd-mm or dd is better imho. Just an opinion tho, use what you like.

    • MxM111@kbin.social
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      11 months ago

      Length, volume and mass specifically (and derivatives, like PSI). Temperature is ok.

      • Omgarm@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        As a celsius user I have absolutely no need for fahrenheit. It needs more numbers when there is no need for more precision. Half a degree C is barely even noticable.

        • KrankyKong@lemmy.ml
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          11 months ago

          It’s one of those things that truly and honestly just doesn’t matter. Celsius makes more sense if you think about water freezing at 0 and boiling at 100, but beyond that it really doesn’t make a big difference.

          • Mauwuro@lemmy.ml
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            11 months ago

            what happens at 0 F?

            I mean 0 C is when the water change its state, but then what happens at 0 F?

            • KrankyKong@lemmy.ml
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              11 months ago

              Nothing in particular, it’s an arbitrary starting point. But that’s really not a good reason to knock it.

              Does water actually freeze at 0 celsius? It depends on the air pressure, right? I guess 0 celsius is the freezing point of water at sea level, but air pressure’s not consistent at all. I guess maybe it’s the temperature water freezes at the average air pressure at sea level? I assume that’s the case.

              The point I’m trying to make is the Celsius isn’t super rock solid either, and it really doesn’t affect anything if water freezes at 0 or 32 degrees. The best argument for celsius is that it’s standard, but that doesn’t make necessarily make it better.

              If we really cared about having a rock-solid starting point, we’d use Kelvin because you literally cannot go below 0.

              • Mauwuro@lemmy.ml
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                11 months ago

                yeah I was looking for something like “at 0 F something happens” as in Centigrades you can be sure that at 0C and with 1atm the water will freeze, instead of something arbitrary, so you can compare calibrate instruments

                • KrankyKong@lemmy.ml
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                  11 months ago

                  Well it doesn’t really matter what you were looking for lol. I promise you Fahrenheit thermometers are calibrated same as Celsius ones.

          • psud@aussie.zone
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            11 months ago

            We live in a world rich in water. When the overnight temperature is below zero, we have frost, for example

        • MxM111@kbin.social
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          11 months ago

          I use both equally well. Since both of them are base 10, no difference whatsoever. You just know the feeling of 70F or 21C.

      • slackassassin@sh.itjust.works
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        11 months ago

        Same, Fahrenheit rules.

        Edit: Fahrenheit kicks ass, I just love it.

        Edit: Sorry, still like it a lot.

        Edit: I just love the scale.

        Edit: Random thought, Fahrenheit is really great. I enjoy it and will continue to use it alongside metic units.

  • MyNameIsIgglePiggle@sh.itjust.works
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    11 months ago

    What really grinds my gears - literally - is having to have two sets of sockets because America. It’s really gets annoying when you lose your 10mm socket and the other one isn’t quite right, but you can’t work out is 18/32s is close enough and then you bust a nut.

    • Polar@lemmy.ca
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      11 months ago

      I just hate the fact if 10mm is too big, I can get 9mm, but if 15/16 is too big, fuck me, I guess. Bringing the full toolbox over because what random fucking bullshit number comes before it?

      Like I’m here to fix shit, not do math to figure out which socket is one size smaller.

    • twei@feddit.de
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      11 months ago

      I just read that as “socks”, which made the last sentence really weird

    • jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works
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      11 months ago

      American cars have been using both metric and SAE fasteners since at least the 1980’s. I wish they would just gone all metric so I wouldn’t have to drag out two socket sets anytime I need to do anything.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    You know what pissed me off earlier this year? We took a trip from the U.S. to Canada and my Prius didn’t even have the option to show kmph instead of mph on the dashboard. We looked through the manual, we looked online. My specific model doesn’t allow it. Why?!

    • Agent641@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Or gun control. Or free healthcare. Or abortion. Or a free online automated tax return system.

      • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
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        11 months ago

        or public transport, ending the war on drugs, LGBTQ+ rights, fixing climate change, eating less meat, funding education, non-predatory student loans, living wage, affordable homes, ending slavery in prisons, ending corporations as people, ending super PACs and lobbying, and establishing ranked choice voting or even basic democratic concepts as one-man-one-vote.

  • SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.works
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    11 months ago

    Arma players are more at home with km than miles because they never leave the basement to use it irl

    (jk I am that guy)

      • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        11 months ago

        100°F is roughly (like really roughly) the hottest temp your likely to see in most temperate climates throughout a year. 0°F is(again really roughly) the lowest. The result is you can use Fahrenheit basically as a percentage, or a 0 to 100 temperature score to help you decide how to dress/prepare for the day. If the temperature is above or below 100 or 0 then you need to consider fairly serious precautions before going outside for any length of time.

        It’s not a very precise system at all, and it obviously has no place in a laboratory or similar situation. But it does work quite well for communicating the weather to common people. There is very little desire among Americans to change to Celsius not because they don’t understand it (we’re all taught Celsius in grade school) but because Fahrenheit serves most people’s needs perfectly adequately.

        OP is also arguing that easily recalling the boiling temperature of water (one of the big purported advantages of Celsius) is useless for most people as nobody actually measures the temperature of water while boiling it. Except, maybe, in a classroom, probably while demonstrating to children how the Celsius scale works.

      • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]@hexbear.net
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        11 months ago

        If it’s 0 F, it’s 0% hot out. If it’s 50 F, it’s 50% hot out, if it’s 100F, it’s 100% hot out.

        It’s a more human measurement. Who the hell knows how long a kilometer or meter is? Everyone knows what a football field looks like and a yard is 1/100th of it.

        • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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          11 months ago

          I mean… I could say the same thing about Celsius and it would make the exact same amount of sense.

            • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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              11 months ago

              100°C is an acceptable sauna temperature. You won’t last much longer naked in 0°C!

              Edit: To make my point more clear, I know some crazy people who go directly from a close to 100 degree sauna to a close to 0 degree ice bath. I think that could be described quite well as going from 100 to 0 % within the human temperature tolerance.

              Also, that’s not my initial point. My initial point was that “percent hot outside” means nothing in Fahrenheit or Celsius.

              (whoops, pressed delete instead of edit)

          • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]@hexbear.net
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            11 months ago

            It has never been literally boiling outside (except for when you’re in the middle of a forest fire or next to a lava flow).

            Besides, Fahrenheit is more scientific because it translates 1:1 to Rankine, where 0 is absolute zero.

            • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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              11 months ago

              Percent of what, exactly? It has been a lot more than 100 Fahrenheit and a lot less than 0.

              Edit: Kelvin is the scientific standard with 0 at absolute zero, and that translates directly to Celsius.

                • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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                  11 months ago

                  Are you just trolling? “100% hot out” literally doesn’t mean anything.

                  Edit: Ah, I see :P

                  But the human body temp isn’t 100 °F, though

        • SolarNialamide@lemm.ee
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          11 months ago

          Who the hell knows how long a kilometer or meter is?

          Everyone outside of America.

          Everyone knows what a football field looks like

          You’re either trolling or a living embodiment of the ‘Americans think the USA is the whole world’ meme. Nobody outside of the USA knows how long a football field is.

        • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
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          11 months ago

          The heck is 50% hot out? How is that even helpful lmao

          28°c is a nice weather but 82.4°f(or 82.4% hot) sounds unlivable.

          • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            11 months ago

            Lol 82.4°F is hot af. Depending on the humidity it could be quite uncomfortable.

            Truly unlivable would be anything over 100.

            50 is fairly mild. Cool, but not really cold at all. Long sleeves, pants, maybe a light jacket weather.

            • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
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              11 months ago

              No it’s not, as i live in the equator, and that’s the issue i have with fahrenheit. The whole thing is devoid of context and people think it makes sense naturally.

          • halfeatenpotato@lonestarlemmy.mooo.com
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            11 months ago

            82.4°f is pretty decent weather. Unlivable is more like 100°f+, hence the “100% hot” scale. Nice weather would be 75°f, which makes sense when you think of it in terms of the “0-100% hot” scale.

            I agree that other things like distance, volume, etc are better in metric. I really wish the US would just standardize metric UOM in general. But I do think fahrenheit is better for temperature.

        • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          11 months ago

          I get what you’re saying, but only people who live in a country where (American) football is played would know how big a football field is.