americans really just have to remember a long list of random numbers like how many ounces a full pint is supposed to be, huh.
i’m imagining a whole day of school like, “when people say nickel, they mean 5 cents, a dime is 10 cents, 12 inches is a foot, 3 feet is a yard, water freezes at 32F and boils at 212F…” and the children just crying into their notebooks by the time they get to miles and tons and acres.
When I first read your comment I wanted to say that managing with these units isn’t really all that difficult. But, then I remembered that I have a magnet on my fridge that converts teaspoons to cups to quarts etc. I don’t know anyone who keeps that info in memory. Doubling or halving an American recipe can be an exciting math project
It’s fun to see what metric conversions an American has memorized. If a person can quickly convert miles to Kilometers, they are probably a runner. If you ask a group of colleagues how many grams are in an ounce, the dude who quickly say “28.3 give or take” is a pothead.
Think about us poor Brits, who have an offhand knowledge of the imperial system the American system’s based on, plus the metric system, and usually the formula to convert between them at least for speed, length, and weight.
I agree that most of the US units aren’t ideal, but I’m not so sure that Fahrenheit is bad. 0F and 100F are both temperatures that humans experience in nature - 0F being a cold winter and 100F being a hot summer. Cities that don’t experience extreme cold or heat usually remain within that range. The scale is granular enough that you usually don’t need to use decimal places.
Freezing temperatures being obvious with a minus number is an advantage, not a problem, IMO. Easy to see from the bigger negative number when water will freeze more quickly, when snow is more likely to lie on the ground, etc.
americans really just have to remember a long list of random numbers like how many ounces a full pint is supposed to be, huh.
i’m imagining a whole day of school like, “when people say nickel, they mean 5 cents, a dime is 10 cents, 12 inches is a foot, 3 feet is a yard, water freezes at 32F and boils at 212F…” and the children just crying into their notebooks by the time they get to miles and tons and acres.
When I first read your comment I wanted to say that managing with these units isn’t really all that difficult. But, then I remembered that I have a magnet on my fridge that converts teaspoons to cups to quarts etc. I don’t know anyone who keeps that info in memory. Doubling or halving an American recipe can be an exciting math project
It’s fun to see what metric conversions an American has memorized. If a person can quickly convert miles to Kilometers, they are probably a runner. If you ask a group of colleagues how many grams are in an ounce, the dude who quickly say “28.3 give or take” is a pothead.
A cup is 32 teaspoons, 3 teaspoons per tablespoon, ergo 1 cup is 16 tablespoons. I know this offhand because:
It’s a base 2 measurement system for the most part. Also highly inefficient and imperfect, but so is metric for cooking.
Well… a tablespoon is 3 teaspoons and a cup is 48 teaspoons. You did get the 16Tbsp per cup right though.
This was a good try!
🤔 Huh. I didn’t believe you until I measured it out on my own measuring spoons. You’re right. My bad fam
Think about us poor Brits, who have an offhand knowledge of the imperial system the American system’s based on, plus the metric system, and usually the formula to convert between them at least for speed, length, and weight.
I agree that most of the US units aren’t ideal, but I’m not so sure that Fahrenheit is bad. 0F and 100F are both temperatures that humans experience in nature - 0F being a cold winter and 100F being a hot summer. Cities that don’t experience extreme cold or heat usually remain within that range. The scale is granular enough that you usually don’t need to use decimal places.
Freezing temperatures being obvious with a minus number is an advantage, not a problem, IMO. Easy to see from the bigger negative number when water will freeze more quickly, when snow is more likely to lie on the ground, etc.