Your favorite units of measurement

[Thaliur]

But my two favorites are inductance, which is measured in Henry's and then conductance, which is measured in Siemens (which is pronounced in a way as to make me do a double take in lecture). Henry's just sounds goofy, and I honestly thought Siemens was an accent error - my professor is from Cyprus - until I saw the word spelled out.

These two are both named after people. Henry was French, and Siemens was German (Werner von Siemens, he invented the first type of indoor elevators). I don't see how they should be weirder than Watt, Joule, Ohm, or Coulomb.

My favourite units of measurement are those directly connected to perception, like sone or candela (Yes, I also prefer the HSB colour coding).
This also counts for "estimated values", like "an arm's length", "three body lengths", "about as strong as a young cat", and such.

Oh, and of course Terry Pratchett's "New York Second" (the time between a traffic light switching to green and the first honking behind you) and "thaum" (The magical energy required to create one white pigeon or three billiard balls)

 

[Jovlo]

I've always liked the candela, the unit of luminous intensity.
Don't ask me why though...

 

[Anarchemitis]

The parsec is pretty cool, but Star Wars made it stupid.
(1 Parsec=3.262 Lightyears)

 

[jamiemac]

The Pint. Just because it implies Beer

In that case, the 'Quart' would be even better...

perhaps, but unfortunately I know of no pubs that sell beer by the quart

 

[The Potato Lord]

I like the kilometer because i can also pronounce it as the Kill-O-Meter!Muwaaaahaha!

 

[iamnotincompliance]

Holy relativity batman, how hard is it to standardise a speed conversion in a series?

It must be fairly difficult, because they still don't have it down. How else do we explain a 70 year trip taking the exact amount of time as a 7 year series?

I also enjoy that quote from Grandpa Simpson: "My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead, and that's the way I likes it." That works out to almost 10.5 feet per gallon, or for our metric friends, 1,185.4815 l / km. Suddenly my 1972 Oldsmobile doesn't seem quite so bad.

 

[Lukeje]

Oh, and of course Terry Pratchett's "New York Second" (the time between a traffic light switching to green and the first honking behind you)

That's not an original Terry Pratchett idea... It's a 'New York Minute' as described by Johnny Carson.

 

[ariamaki]

Hmm... Single specific point of measurement-- the Yoctogram, AKA "One sextillionth of a gram."

Because there are few funnier ways to call something "insignificantly small"

 

[nbrown48]

there is a measurement in geology called "cleavage", as in how much cleavage a rock has. look it up im not joking

 

[EnzoHonda]

I'm a big fan of Celcius/Centigrade. A zero or lower, water freezes, at 100 it boils. No offense to the Fahrenheit-lovers out there, but seriously, it's like a monkey made that system of measurement. I think Fahrenheit made a thermometre, then wrote random numbers on it.

Also, I gotta agree with the nautical-term-lovers here. Fathoms, knots, etc are all cool.

Metric is awesome too. 12mm wrench too small? Pick up a 13mm. Way more fun than having to figure out fractions while you're under your car trying to install an alternator.

 

[stompy]

Metric FTW! (You would know by now I'm Aussie)

Anways, my favourite measurement would most likely be velocity... yeh, it's a boring one, but it's essential for quite a few things. Oh, and I <3 physics.

 

[Lance Icarus]

I love liters, as in a two liter on a Saturday night with your brand new copy of the next hot title.

 

[josh797]

well im back and gonna have to go with cubits as my favorite. its totally weird and no one has ever heard of it cause its from the old testament or torah. its about the distance from the tip of your middle finger to the tip of your elbow, but no one really knows :-D

i also like footcandles because im a lighting designer and it was the way old lighting instruments used to be measured.

also i wanted to say parsecs cuz the millenium falcon could do the kessel run in less than 12 of em

 

[Singing Gremlin]

"Measuring hundreds of Khelgars high!"
"What have I told you about using me as a unit of measurement?!"

That one.

 

[Slingback78]

I'm going to have to go with the ROD, although I always liked saying hectare.

Hectare, hectare, hectare.

Speaking of imperial verus metric, who here living in a recently converted country has older folks say "Imperial just makes more sense"? How in the hell does an arbitrary number of smaller units making up the larger ones make more sense? I still can't remember how many feet to the mile, whereas I learned kilometres/meters in about 5 seconds. 1000 meters=1 km, got it. For some reason, I can remember conversions though.

Anyone hear the odd bitching that Celsius makes no sense? How is it arbitrary to mark 0 degrees as water freezing and 100 at water boiling?

 

[Logan Westbrook]

Speaking of imperial verus metric, who here living in a recently converted country has older folks say "Imperial just makes more sense"? How in the hell does an arbitrary number of smaller units making up the larger ones make more sense?

It depends on what you're used to. If you've grown up with imperial measurements, then they are going to make more sense to you then their metric equivalent, regardless of the fact that the metric system is more 'logical'.

 

[Lukeje]

also i wanted to say parsecs cuz the millenium falcon could do the kessel run in less than 12 of em

Parsecs are actually a measure of distance... Apparently the engines in the Star Wars universe have gotten such that the only way to get anywhere faster is to have a better computer algorithm for calculating the route. Hence, the Millenium Falcon has the best algorithm, and as such is the 'fastest' ship.