alt Hacker News> the useful scale of Fahrenheit is far superior 0-100 versus 0-32.
Well, first of all, I'm not sure why you're defining those scales as the "useful" ones. They don't even equate to each other. But why are you arbitrarily using 100 as the end of your Fahrenheit scale? Just so you can declare it 'Metric-y'? If you read his paper, Fahrenheit's scale is actually 0-96.
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The things that make the metric system superior to prior systems are:
• Using a uniform set of prefixes to designate multiples and divisions of the base units.
Having one unit of say, volume (the liter), and then using prefixes when we need smaller or larger units is way better than having cups, pints, quarts, gallons, pecks, and many more.
• Having those prefixes mean powers of 10. That fits in well with our use of decimal arithmetic.
It is the first one that is most important.
For temperature there's nothing actually 'Metric-y' about Celsius (or Kelvin), because in most cases people don't use multiples or divisions of the base unit. This includes in science and engineering. An astronomer would say (and write in their paper) that a star has a temperature of 7000 K, not 7 kiloK. They would say a neutron star has a core temperature of 100 trillion K, not 100 TK or 100 teraK.
At the low end there is more use of prefixes. The scientists that work near absolute 0 do often use millikelvin and microkelvin. They also often don't. Both 10^-2 Kelvin and 10 mK would usually be acceptable.
A metric system with the same meter, liter, and gram as the current one but that had picked F and R instead of C and K would work fine and be just as 'Metric-y' as the current metric system.
As an engineer, you should not even use temperature at all. All thermodynamic formulas simplify (a lot) if you use the inverse temperature.
Well even 0-96 would be better, but I think 0-100 scales are more useful. Temperatures in most places are within those bounds and it's like a test you are graded on. You get a 0 on the test, that's really cold. You get a 100 - smoking hot.
I'm not 100% sure of the normal upper/lower bounds in everyday life for most people on the planet for Celsius, but let's say it's 0-32. It' just feels weird to me to be operating on that scale versus 0-100 where I see in every day life from battery percentages to test scores.
> Just so you can declare it 'Metric-y'?
In part, yea. But I generally just prefer the Imperial system because of its practicality in everyday life and because it's fun and weird and historical in a way that Metric isn't.