[UPDATE: Vote Passed!] Holy Mole-y - Metric redefines 4 units of measurement

[rcmaehl]

Update:  https://www.wired.com/story/new-kilogram-definition-based-on-planck-constant/
 

Quote

Up until the vote, the kilogram had been based on a platinum-iridium cylinder stored under lock and key in France. Scientists have now scrapped all physical objects from the system. The units are instead based on fundamental constants of nature.  Using this principle, astronauts on Mars could theoretically make a precise tape measure from scratch. These standards offer more stability because fundamental constants don’t change over time.

Source:

Phys.org

 

Summary:

Next week a meeting will be held to redefine 4 metric units: Ampere, kilogram, mole, and Kelvin. These units will be more precise and no longer based on physical objects. Don't expect to suddenly gain 100 kilos though.

 

Media:

Courtesy @VegetableStu:

 

Quotes/Excerpts:

Quote

The General Conference on Weights and Measures have announced...a meeting...four of the base units used in the metric system will be redefined. The four units under review are the ampere, kilogram, mole and kelvin. 

Currently, the kilogram is officially defined as the mass of a cylinder made of a platinum-iridium alloy housed in a bell jar in France. According to officials with CGPM, its days are numbered. The body will be voting to change to a system in which the kilogram will be defined indirectly by using the Planck constant. The reason for the changeover is to reference a more stable basis of measurement and to allow for the development of more precise measuring devices.  Several metrologists involved in bringing the changes to a vote have acknowledged that most people will neither understand the changes that have taken place, nor notice that a change has occurred. The metric system is part of the International System of Units. The speed of light, for example, was updated in 1983. Prior meetings have already resulted in updating the other three base units in the system: the second, meter and candela. If the measures pass, the changes will take effect in May of next year.

 

My Thoughts:
It's about time the Kilo has been updated. It's been based on little cube in a jar that has been slowly degrading over time. Granted these changes can be a bit more scientific... such as a second being 9,192,631,770 cycles of a Caesium atomic clock.

Edited November 17, 2018 by rcmaehl
Vote Passed

[manikyath]

pff.. measuring with bodyparts and rocks is much more accurate.

/s

 

also, isnt the kilogram a fairly major one to be updated? i.e. the last "big one" that was still measured by a physical object?

[imreloadin]

Soooo what are they going to be redefining the ampere, mole, and kelvin as? I see that you quoted that the kilogram is proposed to be redefined indirectly using the Planck constant but no mention of the other units.

[Dissitesuxba11s]

 

In all seriousness, I wonder how this will affect commonly known equations like calculating Celsius from Kelvin by subtracting 273.15. Maybe it will be subtracting it by 273.14?

[Mira Yurizaki]

Just now, manikyath said:

pff.. measuring with bodyparts and rocks is much more accurate.

/s

 

also, isnt the kilogram a fairly major one to be updated? i.e. the last "big one" that was still measured by a physical object?

Yeah. However, amperes and mole are affected by mass so those two were a gimme.

 

Kelvin appears to be also defined by a property of a physical thing, but not related to the kilogram.

[DrMacintosh]

Pff, freaking Metric system can't even agree on a unit of measurement? The Metric system is a tool of the devil! 

 

 

[rcmaehl]

7 minutes ago, imreloadin said:

Soooo what are they going to be redefining the ampere, mole, and kelvin as? I see that you quoted that the kilogram is proposed to be redefined indirectly using the Planck constant but no mention of the other units.

Phys.org doesn't specify. I'll try to look for other articles during my downtime and update.

[imreloadin]

6 minutes ago, Dissitesuxba11s said:

In all seriousness, I wonder how this will affect commonly known equations like calculating Celsius from Kelvin by subtracting 273.15. Maybe it will be subtracting it by 273.14?

This...time to re-learn everything...

[Pixel5]

too bad this wont change anything for country's that officially use metric but never actually implemented it beside in the science field.

 

you know, like the USA

[tikker]

9 minutes ago, imreloadin said:

Soooo what are they going to be redefining the ampere, mole, and kelvin as? I see that you quoted that the kilogram is proposed to be redefined indirectly using the Planck constant but no mention of the other units.

They currently just aren't defined "properly", e.g. in terms of fundamental constants or as true constants. The Ampere will be defined in terms of the elemetary charge, the mole by Avogadro's constant (which will be defined as a fixed number) and the Kelvin such that the Boltzmann constant has a specific value.

[Mira Yurizaki]

2 minutes ago, Pixel5 said:

too bad this wont change anything for country's that officially use metric but never actually implemented it beside in the science field.

 

you know, like the USA

The current set of customary units the US uses are based on metric, ironically enough.

Edited November 12, 2018 by M.Yurizaki

[Taf the Ghost]

27 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

The current set of customary units the US uses are based on metric, ironically enough.

People don't realize that the USA officially adopted the Metric system in the 1860s, but it was never mandatory. Even the 1975 law doesn't make it mandatory. People outside of the States also don't realize it's not that hard to convert between the two. Plus, we mix & match depending on some differential & historical needs. You measure Drugs in Metric and Houses in Imperial.

 

That doesn't mean the Metric System isn't an unholy abomination when applied to everyday practical shopping activities, but it's not that much trouble to switch between. SI is also far less efficient for human-scale production than Imperial is, which is why Americans have stuck to it. Aside from the fact most of the USA was built with 2x4s, so you'd never really get away from it.

[MoonSpot]

Fracking hate moles.

But yea.  If they're changing the Kg then grams, moles and a lot of other things change too.

 

Time to write up tinfoil articles about how they're doing this to hide inflation and fudge numbers for those sweet ad revenues fractional pennies.

[Trik'Stari]

1 minute ago, Taf the Ghost said:

People don't realize that the USA officially adopted the Metric system in the 1860s, but it was never mandatory. Even the 1975 law doesn't make it mandatory. People outside of the States also don't realize it's not that hard to convert between the two. Plus, we mix & match depending on some differential & historical needs. You measure Drugs in Metric and Houses in Imperial.

 

That doesn't mean the Metric System isn't an unholy abomination when applied to everyday practical shopping activities, but it's not that much trouble to switch between. SI is also far less efficient for human-scale production than Imperial is, which is why Americans have stuck to it. Aside from the fact most of the USA was built with 2x4s, so you'd never really get away from it.

Oh god, don't dare suggest that the Metric system is only really superior for scientific use and that the average person can use the imperial system as effectively as any metric user. DAS VERBOTEN.

[Mira Yurizaki]

11 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

People don't realize that the USA officially adopted the Metric system in the 1860s, but it was never mandatory. Even the 1975 law doesn't make it mandatory. People outside of the States also don't realize it's not that hard to convert between the two. Plus, we mix & match depending on some differential & historical needs. You measure Drugs in Metric and Houses in Imperial.

 

That doesn't mean the Metric System isn't an unholy abomination when applied to everyday practical shopping activities, but it's not that much trouble to switch between. SI is also far less efficient for human-scale production than Imperial is, which is why Americans have stuck to it. Aside from the fact most of the USA was built with 2x4s, so you'd never really get away from it.

I like to argue that US measurements for volume is better because of our computer dominated world and volume is in powers of 2.

 

But I don't care either way. Arguing which arbitrary system of measurement is like saying 8-space tab stops is better than 4-space ones.

[rcmaehl]

1 minute ago, M.Yurizaki said:

I like the argue that US measurements for volume is better because of our computer dominated world and volume is in powers of 2.

 

But I don't care either way. Arguing which arbitrary system of measurement is like saying 8-space tab stops is better than 4-space ones.

Tabs > Spaces. It's been proven time and time again.

[Fetzie]

1 hour ago, Dissitesuxba11s said:

 

In all seriousness, I wonder how this will affect commonly known equations like calculating Celsius from Kelvin by subtracting 273.15. Maybe it will be subtracting it by 273.14?

They are redefining the basis for the existing values, not changing them

[Mira Yurizaki]

Just now, rcmaehl said:

Tabs > Spaces. It's been proven time and time again.

The argument is which length the tab stops should be is better.

 

But I don't really care as long as it's consistent. Consistency in your style >>>>>> what's "better"

[poochyena]

54 minutes ago, Pixel5 said:

too bad this wont change anything for country's that officially use metric but never actually implemented it beside in the science field.

 

you know, like the USA

You say that as if the US has banned the metric system. I use metric for just about everything. Speed limits are the only thing that I can't change to metric.

[Taf the Ghost]

1 minute ago, Trik'Stari said:

Oh god, don't dare suggest that the Metric system is only really superior for scientific use and that the average person can use the imperial system as effectively as any metric user. DAS VERBOTEN.

It's a bit beyond this topic, but if you dig deep into the woods on the topic, SI isn't exactly neutral for the intentions of many of its pushers. But, the lack of a naturalistic heuristic within SI means it is always dis-associative within the mind of someone that only learned in base-10. It causes issues, much like anyone that's been taught a constructed language at an early age.

 

I'd also, again, like to point out that we switch between the two all the time, but we keep certain things in certain measures and just use whichever is most practical. Metric is a lot easier for scientific work, but you don't realize how much easier it is to communicate in a real-world project in Imperial. 

[Bananasplit_00]

1 hour ago, imreloadin said:

Soooo what are they going to be redefining the ampere, mole, and kelvin as? I see that you quoted that the kilogram is proposed to be redefined indirectly using the Planck constant but no mention of the other units.

the kelvin will be a change in thermal energy, the ampere will be something something coulombs and the mole i dont remember. 

[ARikozuM]

8 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

But I don't really care as long as it's consistent. Consistency in your style >>>>>> what's "better"

^ This.

 

It's like when I used to help Zach study. He'd highlight important words yellow in one book and in another it would be green. Consistency! 

 

Spoiler

 

Concepts: green.

Words: yellow.

Theorem/postulates: pink. 

 

 

[MyName13]

26 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

 

That doesn't mean the Metric System isn't an unholy abomination when applied to everyday practical shopping activities,

Why?

[ARikozuM]

11 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

It's a bit beyond this topic, but if you dig deep into the woods on the topic, SI isn't exactly neutral for the intentions of many of its pushers. But, the lack of a naturalistic heuristic within SI means it is always dis-associative within the mind of someone that only learned in base-10. It causes issues, much like anyone that's been taught a constructed language at an early age.

 

I'd also, again, like to point out that we switch between the two all the time, but we keep certain things in certain measures and just use whichever is most practical. Metric is a lot easier for scientific work, but you don't realize how much easier it is to communicate in a real-world project in Imperial. 

That skyscraper is either 1,729 feet, 576.3 yards, or 527.0 meters, or 527,000 centimeters. 

 

I'll take the feet and yardage. 

[Mira Yurizaki]

1 hour ago, imreloadin said:

Soooo what are they going to be redefining the ampere, mole, and kelvin as? I see that you quoted that the kilogram is proposed to be redefined indirectly using the Planck constant but no mention of the other units.

Amperes and mole are affected by the kilogram. An ampere is really defined from Newtons, which is derived from the kilogram. Mole is the amount of atoms in 12g of Carbon 12, so changing the kilogram affects that.

 

Kelvin was based on the triple of point of water divided by a number. So they're changing that so the kelvin is based on Boltzmann's constant.