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reactordevyesterday at 11:16 AM4 repliesview on HN

Americans do not do metric. Americans can’t even balance a checkbook. Hence the small dog reference for mental “clarity”. We’re dumb. Just look at the news…


Replies

xandriusyesterday at 12:11 PM

I don't think it's fair to insult all US citizens because of your personal shortcomings.

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mrtksnyesterday at 11:36 AM

Sure but don't they have a mental image for 80 feet for example? Why articles will almost always include something like "that like 50 chairs put next to each other" when length is mentioned.

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SoftTalkeryesterday at 2:25 PM

I know that 1kg is about 2.2lbs but that still doesn't give me the "mental clarity" of what 20kg is unless I do the conversion.

At the gym I use the pound plates and not the kilo ones. I intuitively know what the difference between 135 and 225 lbs feels like, and I don't have that same intution for kg.

All that said, I don't find the "small dog" types of analogies for weight very useful. Why not just use the same number of characters (or less) to give the weight in the other popular unit?

dist-epochyesterday at 11:30 AM

Europeans don't even know what it means to "balance a checkbook", so they must be dumber.

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