666 



SCIENCE 



[Vol. LV, No. 1434 



The same argument in England is made in re- 

 gard to English money. 



The English system . . . has been found ac- 

 ceptable to the great majority of the Latin- 

 American importers and the imports into these 

 countries consist in preponderant degree of manu- 

 factured products into which the English system 

 of weights and measures is definitely incor- 

 porated, ' ' in spite of those countries being metric, 

 p. 158. "Of the millions of dollars worth of ma- 

 chine tools which . . . have (been) sold to France 

 and Germany, the great majority have been sold 

 without request or suggestion that any of tlie 

 dimensions be made in accordance with the metric 

 system, p. 159. 



It would be impossible gradually to substi- 

 tute new metric standards and equipment for the 

 old as the latter wore out without catastrophic 

 confusion to industrial processes through a pro- 

 tracted period. Even if the change were made 

 suddenly, ... a long transition period fraught 

 with confusion and disorder would inevitably 

 follow, p. 175. 



The proposal actually made by scientists that 

 as far as possible metric designations be used 

 for OUT existing English standards the report 

 dismisses briefly by saying that it 

 is impractical and in any event would be quite 

 pointless because it could hardly be considered an 

 adoption of the metric system, p. 175. 



Of the well-known ease of the Baldwin Loco- 

 motive Works building locomotives for Russia 

 purely on metric specifications without chang- 

 ing their equipment, or working force or suf- 

 fering any inconvenience or delay, the report 

 says: 



If we continue to make equipment to esisting 

 standards and merely apply metric designations 

 as was done in the case of the 'metric' locomo- 

 tives built by the Baldwin Locomotive Works, 

 this would be neither the adoption nor the use 

 of the metric system. It would merely be ex- 

 pressing in terms of the metric system, wdth which 

 the English is incommensurable, an existing stand- 

 ard dimension which is integral and exact in the 

 English system. Such a change, it is held, besides 

 being quite meaningless, would, if feasible, simply 

 introduce confusion and error through calling 

 things by wrong names, p. 176. 

 So the report proceeds to tell all of the dire 

 calamities that will certainly befall us when 

 the befuddled teachers and scientists have their 

 way over the practical every-day business man. 



No possible advantages could result from a 

 change to the metric system, but on the contrary, 

 through such a change Great Britain and the 

 United States would lose the vast trade they now 

 possess ■(vith non-metric countries and with respect 

 to metric trade they would surrender their ad- 

 vantages to such metric countries as France and 

 Germany, p. 160. 



In spite of Mr. Halsey's statement given 

 above that products incorporating the English 

 system can be used in countries which have 

 adopted the metric system, it appears that if 

 we adopted the metric system we could not do 

 the same. 



Some conceptions of the difficulties which would 

 be involved in such a destruction of standards is 

 given in the following: . . . All rules, tables, 

 formulie, used in calculations involving measures 

 of length. All drawings of manufactured articles. 

 All measuring scales and measuring tools, calipers, 

 verniers, etc. . . . AH machine tools, leading 

 screws of lathes, . . . locomotives, cars, railroads, 

 and their appurtenances, all marine and station- 

 ary engines, all ships, p. 177. We can not regard 

 the use of both systems on the same machiue as 

 a thing to be tolerated, much less deliberately en- 

 couraged, p. 179. 



The man who can estimate or indicate in 

 words the value of mechanical standards to this 

 country does not live. The cost of attempting to 

 change air-brake hose couplings is not represented 

 by the value of the tools for making the couplings 

 in the Westinghouse Works, but by the infinite 

 confusion of the railroads in getting from one 

 standard to another, p. 187. 



Finally the report attempts to show that 

 whereas every civilized countrj' except Great 

 Britain and the United States is metric, this is 

 only nominally the case. 



The statement that the countries named 

 (France, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Belgium, 

 Switzerland, Italy, Japan, the Central and South 

 American countries, etc., and the Latin acquisi- 

 tions of the United States) customarily employ 

 the metric system is a pure assumption. No evi- 

 dence of this is submitted, while, on the contrary, 

 all available evidence shows that in some of these 

 countries the system is used but Uttle, and in 

 none of them is it universal, p. 168. 



Hence the report suggests 



that a conference of Great Britain, the United 

 States and other countries be called to study care- 

 fully all natural systems of weights and measures 



