Originally Posted by
1500SLR
Can you think what 3/8ths of an inch looks like? I have a fairly decent idea what a millimeter, centimeter, meter and kilometer looks like because they are standard units of measurement. 3/8ths of an inch however... First I need to know what a singlee inch looks like, then I need to know what an eighth of a inch looks like, and then I need to think about what 3 of those looks like. This is a cluster bomb of a situation.
If you had grown up with imperial measurements, YES you would know exactly what they look like. It's a question of familiarity. In the US, we actually use both imperial and metric in different situations. It's not that difficult, really. They are both arbitrarily assigned and adopted for popular use. You have a fairly decent idea of what a mm, cm etc. look like because you have been exposed to them your entire life, not because they are actually any better at measuring, lol. If you grow up speaking only one language, is that language somehow superior to all others?