The spread of metrication [me-tri-key-shuhn] around the world in the last two centuries has been met with both support and opposition. All countries except Myanmar, Liberia, and the US have officially adopted the metric system. It has been partially adopted in the UK and Canada.
One argument used by opponents of the metric system is that traditional systems of measurement were developed organically from actual use. Early measures were human in scale. The prevalence in English of expressions such as a stone’s throw, within earshot, a cartload, or a handful illustrates both the intuitive accessibility and the inherently imprecise nature of analogous measurements and their units.
read more »
The Daily Omnivore 