Unit of Measurement WTF
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@PleegWat said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
a "hectare" is 10000 m² and is used pretty widely.
But not as widely as the “football pitch”, as in, “An area of forest equal to twenty football pitches was cleared of trees.” They could have just said “ten hectares” but no, football pitches it is …
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@Gurth said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@PleegWat said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
a "hectare" is 10000 m² and is used pretty widely.
But not as widely as the “football pitch”, as in, “An area of forest equal to twenty football pitches was cleared of trees.” They could have just said “ten hectares” but no, football pitches it is …
Just as commonly, 20 football pitches is 20 hectares. Particularly if the original source was metric.
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@PleegWat Oh, OK. Whenever I hear or read “football pitches” I mentally halve the number to get to hectares … I guess other people’s ways of thinking about stuff are even weirder than I assumed.
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@Gurth Also, while the a football field is exactly 5000 m² between the lines, most people probably consider up to the fencing, which at a rough estimate is probably closer to 8000 m². Handegg pitches are similar enough in size that the difference is not worth contemplating.
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@Gurth said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@PleegWat said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
a "hectare" is 10000 m² and is used pretty widely.
But not as widely as the “football pitch”, as in, “An area of forest equal to twenty football pitches was cleared of trees.” They could have just said “ten hectares” but no, football pitches it is …
I'm also annoyed by that, but then again and to be fair, most people are more likely to have seen a football pitch than an open one-hectare field (and even more so as the size of open fields is rarely (!) written next to them). So it's not actually a bad comparison point.
Of course when it gets to more than 10-20 of a unit, what most people will remember is just "much larger than this unit" rather than an accurate representation.
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@Gurth said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
other people’s ways of thinking about stuff are even weirder than I assumed.
YMBNH
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@PleegWat said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Gurth Also, while the a football field is exactly 5000 m² between the lines
That’s not at all a given. 100 by 50 metres is a handy mean, but IRL:
3. Dimensions
• Length (touchline):
minimum 90 m (100 yds)
maximum 120 m (130 yds)• Length (goal line):
minimum 45 m (50 yds)
maximum 90 m (100 yds)Competitions may determine the length of the goal line and touchline within the above dimensions.
The allowed ranges are more limited for international matches, but not by that much.
@remi said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
Of course when it gets to more than 10-20 of a unit, what most people will remember is just "much larger than this unit"
From Zodiac:
Actually, the shit coming out of Basco's pipe was a hundred thousand times more concentrated than was legally allowed. The difference between pH 13 and pH 8 was five, which meant that pH 13 was ten to the fifth power—a hundred thousand times—more alkaline than pH 8. That kind of thing goes on all the time. But no matter how many diplomas are tacked to your wall, give people a figure like that and they'll pass you off as a flake. You can't get most people to believe how wildly the eco-laws get broken. But if I say "More than twice the legal limit," they get comfortably outraged.
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a racoon the “size of a big dog or a small pig”
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@boomzilla said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
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@Gurth said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@PleegWat said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Gurth Also, while the a football field is exactly 5000 m² between the lines
That’s not at all a given. 100 by 50 metres is a handy mean, but IRL:
Using long-dead kings' body parts for measuring stuff is one thing, but is using three different definitions of the same length in one drawing.
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I also find it funny that the corner circle radius is measured from the (approximate?) centre of the lines at the pitch corner, to the outside of the circle.
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That thing was designed by jocks. They aren't the most attentive students in geometry class.
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The lines will also be painted onto the pitch by people who are unlikely to see any issues with this, and given the relative dimensions, tolerances are loose enough anyway that it works out in the end.
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@Gurth said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
The lines will also be painted onto the pitch by people who are unlikely to see any issues with this, and given the relative dimensions, tolerances are loose enough anyway that it works out in the end.
"We're supposed to measure them? We've always just done it by repainting over the old lines."
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I don't think it's that that weird that when specifying minimums & maximums in multiple measuring systems, doing rounding in the direction such that the rounded value is compliant with the rule. Those look to be initially specified in yards, and then rounded to meters, where for things that are minimums they round up to the next meter, except for things with tighter tolerances they round up to the next centimeter. Except for the field minimum dimension, where they look to be initially specified in meters and then rounded up to the next 5 yards. Uh, never mind, forget I said anything.
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@Zecc
TIL Liberia is a Western country, probably more advanced then Murica.
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@Luhmann said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zecc
TIL Liberia is a Western country, probably more advanced then Murica.It's a tad west of Portugal so yes
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@Luhmann said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zecc
TIL Liberia is a Western country, probably more advanced then Murica.People do confuse its flag emoji for Murica often enough.
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@Luhmann said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zecc
TIL Liberia is a Western country, probably more advanced then Murica.The easternmost point in Liberia is in River Gee County at approximately 7°55′W. Land's End in Cornwall is at approximately 5°43′. So yes, every part of Liberia has a greater claim of being a "Western" country than England has.
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@da-Doctah of the day winner.
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@da-Doctah said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
Land's End in Cornwall is at approximately 5°43′.
The Isles of Scilly (part of Cownwall) are at W 6°19′. Rockfall is far further west (13°41′), but isn't part of England (I'm not sure, but it is either part of Scotland or some special direct holding of the Crown; none of us want to live or work there so it doesn't matter).
Your point still stands.
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@Zecc So that's why the handegg is called a football!
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@dkf said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
Rockfall is far further west (13°41′), but isn't part of England (I'm not sure, but it is either part of Scotland or some special direct holding of the Crown; none of us want to live or work there so it doesn't matter).
Everything matters to .
Rock
fall is part of Scotland, according to the UK, but Ireland disagrees, even though it's closer to Scotland than Ireland. Ireland doesn't even make a claim to it, itself; it merely rejects the UK's claim. Ireland being disagreeable just for the sake of being disagreeable.You couldn't live or work there if you wanted to. It's a barren rock about 30 m (100 feet) in diameter that juts 17 m (56 feet) out of the ocean, more than 300 km from the nearest other land (a small island off the coast of Scotland that is itself uninhabited, and which would be the westernmost point in the UK if not for Rockfall). No fresh water. No resources except fish and (probably) bird guano. No reason for anyone to claim it, except territorial waters (not even an exclusive economic zone, because it's uninhabitable).
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@HardwareGeek reading the Wikipedia page, as a true certainly needs to do at some point, reveals that post-Brexit an Irish ship was ordered by British officers to leave the 12-miles zone (the page doesn't say if the ship complied and since the order apparently came from a land-based authority, not a ship in the area, I'd assume that the fishermen just shrugged it off and kept fishing). The 12-miles zone is apparently now excluded from licenses for EU fishing boats, with the Irish claiming it's costing them EUR 7 millions/yr (but I suspect they could equally claim eleventy bazillions, since that's probably just a random number made up to make it sound important).
So there's definitely a reason for people to claim it, or rather the waters around it. But the rock itself... not so much.
(apparently the original UK claim in the 50's was borne out of fear that if it wasn't claimed by them, another country (read: USSR) could do so and use it to spy on their nuclear missile program)
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@remi TIL the difference between EEZ and territorial waters (200 miles vs. 12 miles); the 12 mile exclusion applies even though the 200 mile zone explicitly does not.
reading the Wikipedia page, as a true certainly needs to do at some point
I did, but not the whole thing, because .
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@dkf said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
The Isles of Scilly (part of Cownwall) are at W 6°19′.
Is "Cownwall" the local Sciwwy pronunciation?
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@da-Doctah said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@dkf said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
The Isles of Scilly (part of Cownwall) are at W 6°19′.
Is "Cownwall" the local Sciwwy pronunciation?
The emphasis usually hits the vowels not the consonants in the local dialect.
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@da-Doctah said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@dkf said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
The Isles of Scilly (part of Cownwall) are at W 6°19′.
Is "Cownwall" the local Sciwwy pronunciation?
Not as far as I know. The scilly pronunciation is more like "Kernow".
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@HardwareGeek said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
You couldn't live or work there if you wanted to. It's a barren rock about 30 m (100 feet) in diameter that juts 17 m (56 feet) out of the ocean
People aren't trying hard enough. We've built on smaller:
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@ixvedeusi They were using long millions.
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@LaoC Shouldn't they mention that's less than 60 times the distance from New York to LA or something?
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@PleegWat said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@LaoC Shouldn't they mention that's less than 60 times the distance from New York to LA or something?
Anything other than metric.
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@Zerosquare said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@LaoC said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
But are they American or European washing machines?
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@Zecc said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zerosquare said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@LaoC said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
But are they American or European washing machines?
What is the mean flight speed of an American washing machine?
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@dkf said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zecc said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zerosquare said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@LaoC said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
But are they American or European washing machines?
What is the mean flight speed of an American washing machine?
Relative to what?
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@dkf said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zecc said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@Zerosquare said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@LaoC said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
But are they American or European washing machines?
What is the mean flight speed of an American washing machine?
Is it an unladen washing machine, though? Perhaps it’s carrying a load by the power cable.
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@Zerosquare said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
16 washing machines? That's nothing.
Is that linear dimension or total volume? If the volume is equivalent to 16 washing machines, that's only 3.126 washing machines in diameter*. But if it's 16 washing machines in diameter, then it has a volume of 50.27 washing machines.
* Assuming a perfect sphere, or maybe a spheroid with axial dimensions proportional to those of a washing machine, which are not generally perfect cubes.
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Forget it
Jake@HardwareGeek , it's journolism.
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@LaoC Are those washing machines integrated into the IoS? Then the danger that they could crash would be enormous!
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@BernieTheBernie said in Unit of Measurement WTF:
@LaoC Are those washing machines integrated into the IoS?
Internet of Soap...
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@dkf You mean it would provide us with an enormous soap opera?