Pedantry in Action
Everyone knows that a calorie is a unit of heat energy defined to be what’s required to raise one milliliter of water one degree Celsius1. I had assumed it was a metric unit. Mais non! System Internationale has only 7 basic units, and 22 more named derived units. 13 more units outside the SI are officially approved for use with SI units. And 11 more are currently accepted, but continued use is discouraged. And calorie isn’t to be found in any of those lists.
More fun metric facts! The kilogram is the only SI unit with a prefix as part of its name and symbol.
1 For small values of everyone. And it’s actually more complicated than that.
That is why it is so difficult to maintain a low calorie diet. Which calorie are you talking about?
Posted by Camilo on December 12 2004 17:37
other funny units I wish they would stop using:
"barrel of oil" == 42 gallons (US or Imperial?) of oil
How much gasoline does that make, and how much energy is that, and how many batteries is that equivalent to, and how much stationary bicycling is that, and how many loaves of whole grain hippie bread is that, and how long does it take for the sun to shine on a square meter of roof to give you that, and how much sun and primeval forest was decomposed to make that much crude oil,...
Until you can answer these simple quanitative questions, you've just blathering about ecology, and should join the Sierra Club, with the rest of the blatherers. Like that guy talking to Sis,
http://www.mememachinego.com/archives/001589.html
other funny units I wish they would stop using:
"tons of TNT", "kilotons of TNT", "megatons of TNT"
How many calories is that? Who uses tons of TNT, except the guy who has to load a B-52?
For every energy transaction, there is a useful part, and a wasted part (entropic part). The idea behind efficiency, like in a Prius, say, is to reduce the wasted part. The idea behind loading the B-52 is to make it all wasted.
Hiroshima == 12 kilotons of TNT
Tsar Bomba == 50 megatons of TNT (biggest ever tested; thermonuclear; was intended to be 100 Megaton, until they pulled out their slide rules and thought better of it.) (wikipedia it)
Dec 26 2004, earthquake == 32,000 megatons of TNT ( (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/faq/meas.html#19)) or 133 exajoules (1.33×1020 joules). see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake
How much stationary bicycling is that?
How much to take down an airliner? http://www.mememachinego.com/archives/001584.html 5 ounces, about what you typically hide in your running shoes.
Did you know a pound of whole grain hippie bread has more energy than a pound of TNT?
http://muller.lbl.gov/teaching/Physics10/chapters_Jan_2004/Chapter01.htm
other funny units:
"miles per gallon"
First, neither miles nor gallon are SI. Then miles is a length, gallons a volume, so mpg is really "per meter squared" in SI, ie an inverse area. See Resnick and Halliday ~5th edition.
Posted by asdfasfd on January 1 2005 13:20
The previous poster is an idiot!! His or her comments are completely off topic and have NOTHING to do with pedantry, they are actually useful.
I will try to save the day and return this discussion to its appropriate topic, by mentioning that "Zed" (not his or her real fakename) errors when s/he says "calorie" is not metric. The error arises from his/her mistaken idea that "metric"=="SI". As it developed over time, there were a number of metric , based 10, units that were developed, including "calorie", each in a particular subfield, like "thermodynamics". It's just that the heavily logical Frenchy SI says we will henceforth use THESE particular units, then everything will be great, mais oui.
For maximum, confusion , just look at the various units for electomagmetic quanties, and the metric units known as "cgs", (centimeter, gram, second), wherein even the equations fof physics have to be written differently.
I hope you have an excellent pedantic day.
Posted by antiasdfasdf on January 1 2005 13:46