With the inauguration of President-elect Obama looming, and his promise to “once again make science the top American priority”, I can only hope he lobbies for the gradual implementation of the metric system.

America is basically a laughing stock to the advanced world for failing to comply with the internationally accepted metric system, instead continuing with the more complicated English standard.

Would it be appropriate for President Obama to push such legislation? We already allowed ourselves this much ‘change’, why not keep progressing?

For those wondering about America’s metric interest: Congress passed the Metric Conversion Act of 1975 “to coordinate and plan the increasing use of the metric system in the United States”. The Act, however, did not require a ten-year conversion period. A process of voluntary conversion was initiated, and the U.S. Metric Board (USMB) was established for planning, coordination, and public education. In 1981, the Board reported to Congress that it lacked the clear Congressional mandate necessary to bring about national conversion. Due to this apparent ineffectiveness, and in a Reagan effort to reduce federal spending, as well as conscious efforts by Reagan administration officials to end metrication, the Metric Board was disbanded in the fall of 1982.

I remember my Dad saying Kodak park instituted tons of metric standards and never ended up having to use them. Tons of kids across America have trouble with advanced science classes because of a fundamental inability to grasp metric conversions. It’s an absolute travesty, and yet we sit here and wring our hands about why our children test so poorly when their knowledge is compared to the rest of the world’s.

Thomas Friedman wrote in an op-ed for the NY Times this week that, “If we’re so smart, why are other people living so much better than us? What has become of our infrastructure, which is so crucial to productivity?…My fellow Americans, we can’t continue in this mode of ‘Dumb as we wanna be.”

People will complain that metric is too hard. That thinking in new conversion terms is too difficult. Americans don’t like to work hard. It’s not hard to think in metric, it’s actually easier. It’s just different thinking in metric, and older folks don’t like change. People have no idea how much a kilogram is because they have no experience with one. A little exposure and they’d learn fast. Once they get to know metric, converting it to any other metric is extremely simple and easy to do in your head. Just move the decimal place around. With the English system you must have a calculator or estimate in your head. Metric would be a powerful move.

The reason we failed to convert to the metric system in the first place was that everyone tried to keep the English standard under the covers. 55mph speed limits became 88kph, make it 100kph for ease. A 5lb bag of sugar was 2.27kg, make it 2 or 3 kg.

Twenty years after abandoning the metric system, we still have 2l bottles for soda and run 5k races.

And the end of the day, for a conversion to be successful, society needs to think in metric, even if you’re still converting in your head.

It won’t be easy. And it will probably piss a lot of people off. We’ll see cheap bumper stickers claiming ‘Our metrics don’t run’ on lots of trucks. We’ll hear more about socialism and Freedom Fried but enough is enough America. As Mr. Friedman said, “We can’t continue in this mode of ‘Dumb as we wanna be.”

Map of Metric system use highlighted in Green. For those scoring at home, that leaves America, Liberia, and Burma in Black.