Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. Although several Europeans called for a universal measurement system beginning in the 1600s, none came about till the aftermath of the French Revolution, when the people in France were willing to rid themselves of the old order and old and irrational modes of thinking. The new meter was determined over a period of six years, and equaled what measurement?
2. France adopted the metric system in 1795, and began receiving delegates and scientists in order to sell the idea for international use. Since the French had helped America win the American Revolution just 12 years prior, one might assume the two would work together on this project, but what happened in 1794 to kindle hostilities between the two nations to the point that France did not invite an American delegation?
3. By the end of the US Civil War, France, Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Romania, and Mexico had all adopted the metric system. President Andrew Johnson and Congress recognized this, and signed into law an act that did what?
4. In 1875, France and the United States were on good enough terms that an American delegation was invited to the Metre Convention. The result of the convention was the Treaty of the Metre, which set up multiple international organizations pertaining to metrology. Which of these was NOT one of them?
5. In 1893, Thomas Mendenhall was the head of the US Coast and Geodetic Survey. After years of determining the imperial system was unstable, he issued the Mendenhall Order, which effectively put the USA on the metric system. How was this done?
6. In 1971, the US Metric Study, conducted by the US National Bureau of Standards, released "A Metric America: A Decision Whose Time Has Come" after a 3-year investigation. It was presented to Congress with a proposed deadline of how many years before the United States would be fully metric?
7. In response to the US Metric Study of 1971, Congress passed the Metric Conversion Act of 1975. Unfortunately for the study, one aspect of the law failed to make it effective. What was it?
8. Metric conversions in private industries took mainly two different routes - hard metric and soft metric. Hard metric industries converted virtually everything to metric, while those in soft metric used some metric, but retained much of the imperial system. What is an example of a hard metric industry?
9. Despite the ineffectiveness of the Metric Conversion Act of 1975, Congress did want to introduce metric measurements to almost all packaging of consumer products. They passed the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act, requiring contents of these goods to be labeled with both the imperial and metric systems. When was this law passed?
10. One of the most infamous incidents in the imperial/metric confusion happened in 1999, when a NASA mission resulted in catastrophic failure because Lockheed Martin, a contractor for the mission, used pound force seconds instead of newton seconds. The spacecraft lost far too much altitude, and likely burned up in the atmosphere of what planet?
Source: Author
illiniman14
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bloomsby before going online.
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