I found this article on Facebook¹, which argues that the Fahrenheit system is better for everyday use than the Celsius scale because it corresponds to a human range of hot and cold, rather than to the scientific but arbitrary freezing and boiling points of water. I find this argument obviously correct.

But in fact, the Celsius scale is only the tip of the 32-degree iceberg. I hold that the whole metric system dehumanizes us, when we use it out of its proper context.

That’s not me being funny to make a point: I actually believe that using the metric system for everything cheapens the human experience. Some people use this map, with countries that use the metric system in green and those that do not in gray, to mock the United States as a hopeless yokel of a nation:²

To me, that map shows the US as a lone holdout of common sense and civilization.

The metric system was developed to accomplish a few specific goals. It simplifies calculating higher or lower by its omnipresent powers of ten. It aligns, where possible, different kinds of measurement; a cubic centimeter of water is also one milliliter, and at four degrees Celsius it has a mass of one gram. In the laboratory, say, or in large scale manufacturing, these properties are no doubt desirable, because the extreme precision required comes most easily when unencumbered by factors purely human.

And it is for the exact same reason that the metric system ruins the glory and splendor and even romance of every day life.

A meter, for example, is the length light travels in about one three-hundred millionth of a second. That is a very precise definition, but to any person who does not go around noting the precise locations of photons, it is a useless definition. A foot, on the other hand, is about the length of a man’s foot when he wears a shoe.

A liter is the volume of a container 10 centimeters long, wide, and high. A cup is about as much as you get in a cup. A pint is two of those; the perfect size for a serving of beer.

The metric system has no connection to humanity as such. You can see this just by looking at the arts.

When Shylock demands a pound of flesh, we shudder; if he demanded a kilogram, we would laugh. When Falstaff says Peace, good pint-pot to the hostess, he is a having a good time; if he said Peace, good point-five-liter-pot, he would be a pedant.

No-one would be much moved if Frost sighed But I have promises to keep and kilometers to go before I sleep, and kilometers to go before I sleep.

I do not say that no-one has ever or will ever write a poem about a kilometer; only that I doubt that anyone has or will write a good one.

It does no good to say that measurement has nothing to do with art. That answer proves my point; it loses that part of the human experience that sees the romance in the mile of a thousand steps, that perceives the relationship of man to the cosmos.

The imposition of the metric system on the public first occurred during the French Revolution. If it was the most minor atrocity of the Jacobin’s bloody and merciless rationalism, it was also the most lasting. It embodies the Revolution’s determination to cram the majestic complexity of the world into a human mechanical design.

When someone says that we should give up our old miles for kilometers or pounds for kilograms, what they are really saying is that our everyday life were more like a machine, or a laboratory, or a mass production facility; that it would be less like humanity, and less like life.

I prefer humanity to machinery, and I value art over easy convertibility. And if I am the last man to measure my journeys in miles, I will probably be the man who enjoys them most along the way.