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Re: The Metric System
Old 05-18-2010, 06:59 PM   #9
manasecret
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Default Re: The Metric System

Quote:
Originally Posted by KillerGremlin View Post
What is really a mind fuck is when you throw non-Metric, non-Imperial units into the mix: Kelvin for temperature, Cubic Meters for volume, and Joules instead of Calories for energy. [/url]
This is kind of where units in engineering get fun. You can derive many units into the form of something else. For example, an Ampere is actually how much charge passes a given space per second -- C/s, or Coulombs per second. Deriving an amp down to C/s gives you a much more visceral feeling of what an amp really is. It's like a speedometer, but for electric charge.

Another plus of messing with units is that you can often derive an equation that solves for some variable given some other variables, by just figuring out where the units should go. Units give you a nice check to make sure your calculation didn't fuck up somewhere.
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Last edited by manasecret : 05-18-2010 at 07:05 PM.
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