Speech pattern and typographical variations across Canada

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Andy6

I don't think it faded away at all. It was the Dominion of Canada when I was a child and that was long after WW II. But even by then, Trudeau (père) and his friends had begun to deliberately suppress official usages of the term. Dominion Day was still going strong as Dominion Day until the Liberals suddenly informed us that it would henceforth be "Canada Day" - just as institutions like the Dominion Bureau of Statistics suddenly had new, generic-sounding names like "Statistics Canada" that respected neither tradition nor basic rules of English syntax. It was mostly that they wanted government departments to have names that looked similar in English and French and "Dominion" was allegedly meaningless in French (or too colonial or something). It was also from a love of streamlining, rationalization and simplification that was all the rage in many facets of life in the 50s and 60s (e.g. the very modern design of the new flag, PET's elimination of the separate identities of the Navy, Air Force and Army and of course the adoption of our beloved metric system).

Well aren't you the crochety old change-hater.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Andy6

I don't think it faded away at all.

It faded away in the sense that it is no longer in common usage. I suppose some might use the word "killed", but that's a matter of opinion.

The only time I ever hear the word "Dominion" uttered in reference to Canada (apart from historical references) is when someone is complaining about Trudeau renaming Dominion Day.

And what's wrong with the metric system?!?

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by esquire

And what's wrong with the metric system?!?

To play devil's advocate (because I strongly prefer the metric system), the metric system is much better for science and technology applications but is sort of misaligned with familial, everyday measures that ordinary people need to use.

For example, 10 cm cannot be divided in 3, 4, or 6 very easily. A 12 inch foot can. Losing 10 lbs is much more attainable than losing 10 kgs, and saying that you lost 4 kgs doesn't have quite the same ring. A pound per square inch is a tangible amount of force; a Newton per square meter is hardly noticeable. There's that joke in 1984 about a pint being more substantial than a half litre, and it's kind of true.

Where the metric system is more intuitive to ordinary people, it's in regular use, even among older generations. Degrees celsius is much more intuitive than degrees Fahrenheit, especially in a cold country like Canada. Anything with a minus sign is below freezing, and you know that it's cold. -20 and below is very cold; +30 and above is very hot. I've never heard a Canadian of any age use Fahrenheit to describe the air temperature that day.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

To play devil's advocate (because I strongly prefer the metric system), the metric system is much better for science and technology applications but is sort of misaligned with familial, everyday measures that ordinary people need to use.

For example, 10 cm cannot be divided in 3, 4, or 6 very easily. A 12 inch foot can. Losing 10 lbs is much more attainable than losing 10 kgs, and saying that you lost 4 kgs doesn't have quite the same ring. A pound per square inch is a tangible amount of force; a Newton per square meter is hardly noticeable. There's that joke in 1984 about a pint being more substantial than a half litre, and it's kind of true.

.

I am pretty sure you are simply talking like someone who is used to a particular measuring system.

You can aim to lose 5 kilos and it's even better than losing 10 pounds.

When measuring very roughly a metre is just as easy as a yard as it's about one pace for an average size adult person.

Someone who is six feet tall in imperial is simply "one eighty five" in metric height for people who are used to that.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I am pretty sure you are simply talking like someone who is used to a particular measuring system.

Nailed it.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by esquire

Nailed it.

I've heard enough Frenchmen rattle off "un grand mec d'un mètre quatre-vingt-cinq" with the exact same ease and familiarity that we'd say "un grand gars de six pieds"...

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I am pretty sure you are simply talking like someone who is used to a particular measuring system.

You can aim to lose 5 kilos and it's even better than losing 10 pounds.

When measuring very roughly a metre is just as easy as a yard as it's about one pace for an average size adult person.

Someone who is six feet tall in imperial is simply "one eighty five" in metric height for people who are used to that.

If people are used to something, and it works for their purposes, who cares?

My argument is that certain imperial measures were retained because they were inuitive, and certain metric measures were adopted because they were intuitive. I can't think of a better explanation for why people measure their height in feet and talk about the weather in degrees C.

[Boris2k7]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I am pretty sure you are simply talking like someone who is used to a particular measuring system.

You can aim to lose 5 kilos and it's even better than losing 10 pounds.

When measuring very roughly a metre is just as easy as a yard as it's about one pace for an average size adult person.

Someone who is six feet tall in imperial is simply "one eighty five" in metric height for people who are used to that.

Yeah.

I'm a work position where I've had to convert back and forth from metric to imperial all the time. You'll do a survey for a house, for example, where all the measurements are done on the ground in metric (accurate to the millimetre) but all the building materials (and frequently building plans) are in Imperial. As someone who grew up with metric and didn't like shop class very much, I got used to converting between the two systems pretty quick.

Oh, and nothing can get me over the absurdity of Imperial wrench sizes. There is no way you'll ever convince me that it is somehow easier to work with a number like 2-15/16" rather than 75 mm.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

If people are used to something, and it works for their purposes, who cares? What are you trying to argue, here?

My argument is that certain imperial measures were retained because they were inuitive, and certain metric measures were adopted because they were intuitive. I can't think of a better explanation for why people measure their height in feet and talk about the weather in degrees C.

My point is that no system of measurement is inherently non-intuitive. It's just a question of habit.

I personally find measuring stuff in centimetres to be a lot easier and more logical than in inches. I mean WTF is 1 inch plus a quarter plus one eighth? How user-friendly is that?

Still, when it comes to doing work around the house, the combination of my dad and my father-in-law helping me out (and who both were raised with imperial), plus the fact that all of our products and tools tend to be imperially-calibrated, compel me to use imperial.

[rousseau]

Be it noted that on the Vinyl Cafe the other night Stuart McLean pronounced "croissants" correctly.

I find Stuart McLean's obvious aping of Jimmy Stewart's vocal mannerisms and rhythm of speech rather off-putting myself. It's like he's doing an impression without admitting to it. Not my cup of tea.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Be it noted that on the Vinyl Cafe the other night Stuart McLean pronounced "croissants" correctly.

I find Stuart McLean's obvious aping of Jimmy Stewart's vocal mannerisms and rhythm of speech rather off-putting myself. It's like he's doing an impression without admitting to it. Not my cup of tea.

I never knew or noticed. Then again I am not familiar with Jimmy Stewart's style TBQH. Only the name really.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Acajack

My point is that no system of measurement is inherently non-intuitive. It's just a question of habit.

While this is true to an extent, and anything can be forced into habit, I think humans still relate to things at certain innate scales.

The imperial system - which I agree is a dog's breakfast of non-compatible measures totally unsuited to scientific applications - is a dog's breakfast because it is pre-modern and reflects everyday use in single, everyday applications. The metric system, being a product of the scientific revolution, is grounded in compatibility to a universe where everything: mass, time, distance - can be related. But that doesn't mean that all the base units of the metric system are particularly well-suited to everyday intuition. Again, I refer to the SI base unit for pressure: the Newton/m2. In everyday terms, this is equivalent to the weight of a tomato (100 grams) spread over the floor area occupied by a fridge (1 m2). No wonder nobody except scientists use this; even in fully metric countries most people tend to use the non-standard kPa.

[SignalHillHiker]

The Royal Newfoundland Constabulary is currently doing checkpoints to check for winter readiness and handing out tickets for all sorts of things.

Saw an FB post about it with an infographic explaining what they're looking for. Said "motorway", "tyres", etc.

Got all confused because those terms no longer exist here, even among the older generation.

They were just sharing a British infographic to explain the process.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

While this is true to an extent, and anything can be forced into habit, I think humans still relate to things at certain innate scales.

The imperial system - which I agree is a dog's breakfast of non-compatible measures totally unsuited to scientific applications - is a dog's breakfast because it is pre-modern and reflects everyday use in single, everyday applications. The metric system, being a product of the scientific revolution, is grounded in compatibility to a universe where everything: mass, time, distance - can be related. But that doesn't mean that all the base units of the metric system are particularly well-suited to everyday intuition. Again, I refer to the SI base unit for pressure: the Newton/m2. In everyday terms, this is equivalent to the weight of a tomato (100 grams) spread over the floor area occupied by a fridge (1 m2). No wonder nobody except scientists use this; even in fully metric countries most people tend to use the non-standard kPa.

Wasn't the metric system the product of the French Revolution with the aim of promoting their ideal of 'pure reason'?

[SignalHillHiker]

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[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Wasn't the metric system the product of the French Revolution with the aim of promoting their ideal of 'pure reason'?

Could be. I think the idea behind decimalization has even earlier roots and the intercompatibility of the different units is, of course, Newtonian, but the French Revolution really did try to give it a big push.

The metric system we use today has some major differences from some of the French Republican measurements. They had a 100 second hour with 10 hours a day that basically only lasted until the end of the Revolution.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I am pretty sure you are simply talking like someone who is used to a particular measuring system.

You can aim to lose 5 kilos and it's even better than losing 10 pounds.

When measuring very roughly a metre is just as easy as a yard as it's about one pace for an average size adult person.

Someone who is six feet tall in imperial is simply "one eighty five" in metric height for people who are used to that.

185 units is as easy to conceive as 6 units? I guess that, given the lack of alternatives, you can define a typical height as 185 cm and kind of work up and down from there, but how far from the spirit of metric that is!

The absurdity of metric is that there is no unit between a centimetre and a metre -- making the description of the vast majority of objects we encounter in everyday life awkward.

But that's not just a coincidence ... the whole idea of metric, coming out of the spirit of French Enlightenment rationalism, was to divorce measurement from empirical human experience and recreate it as something objective and absolute -- thus the idea that unlike a foot (which was defined in a humble human way, according to the size of a king's foot -- LOL, how arbitrary and unscientific is that!!!) the metre was to be born of rationality -- as 1/10,000,000 of the distance from the North Pole to the Equator. This of course turned out to be a supreme example of rationalist hubris as they inevitably got it wrong (not that there was really any "it" to get).

Also, the numerological worship of 10s is silly as well, given that, as has been pointed out, human beings don't typically judge fractions of a linear unit by mentally dividing it into ten and counting -- rather, in our imperfect state (such as was not appreciated in the age of the French Revolution when Metric all came about) we halve the unit, then halve it again, etc. That's why it's easy to figure out what 1/8 of an inch is, and hard to figure out what (say) .4 centimetres is (if you do figure the latter out, it's usually going to be by cheating and using Metrically-impure 2s to go through a halving exercise, rather than sticking to the holy 10s, which would be the choice of a computer, perhaps, but not of a human being.)

Not to mention that it is an unchangeable fact that most of Canada is laid out physically in Imperial distances, with the whole of the Prairies being made up of 1 square mile agricultural units and "mile roads" and 50, 100 and 200 acre plots of land (etc.) being the rule in most other parts of the country.

I can do temperatures too, if there's any demand!

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Andy6

The absurdity of metric is that there is no unit between a centimetre and a metre -- making the description of the vast majority of objects we encounter in everyday life awkward.

There are decimeters ... admittedly less common here but you certainly encounter it in places where metric is more entrenched than it is here.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by esquire

There are decimeters ... admittedly less common here but you certainly encounter it in places where metric is more entrenched than it is here.

Yes, when we were in school and they were introducing metric, we were made to memorize all of those units, but then they never actually materialized anywhere in real life. Maybe in France?

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by Andy6

185 units is as easy to conceive as 6 units? I guess that, given the lack of alternatives, you can define a typical height as 185 cm and kind of work up and down from there, but how far from the spirit of metric that is!

I actually find your "defence" of the Imperial system rather convincing, but one thing regarding the supposedly better user-friendliness of less over more units: we seem to do fine with weights measured in pounds, but any non-British person is flummoxed by the British system of "stones" (one stone equals 14 pounds).

I can easily visualize a prospective person at any weight from 100 to 300 pounds, but I can't wrap my head around "15 stone 7" without doing a very slow calculation.

But "6 foot 3" is analogous here. Brits, Canadians and Americans all understand it perfectly, but are hard pressed to visualize an abstraction like 185 cm, which the rest of the world uses while not getting our "6 foot 3."

It's an odd one, using metric for everything but body height and weight. I can't understand food in the supermarket in Imperial, it's all kilos and mg and ml (though not for recipes--I do the conversion for those, or just use teaspoons and tablespoons), and distances to me are strictly in km, but height and weight only make sense to me in feet and pounds. It doesn't matter what it says on my driver's licence.

I don't really see that changing here.

One thing I've noticed Americans (the last holdouts!) using more and more is millimetres, which doesn't have a good Imperial equivalent.

This isn't to do with metric at all, but I feel an instinctive resistance to the use of the 24-hour military clock in Quebec to tell the time, e.g. "seize heures" for 4 pm, etc. I wonder, would people in Quebec really not understand you if you said you wanted to meet at "9 o'clock this evening"? Or would that be so unconventional that your Quebec friend, were he or she on a phone to a third friend in your presence, convert what you said to "vingt et une heures"?

I have to do the math in my head and subtract 12 when I hear the time in Quebec, as "20 hundred hours" doesn't register for me right away. I was never a soldier, I guess.

I realize this post is a curmudgeonly whinge against a world that doesn't do things my way!