> There are only three things the UK uses Imperial units for: road signage (speed limits, distances, and vehicle dimension restrictions; and since 2016 all new dimension restriction signage has to be in dual-SI and Imperial units[1]), beer, and milk

Do people not weigh themselves in stones and pounds?

▲ dspillett 7 months ago | parent | next [-]

> Do [UK] people not weigh themselves in stones and pounds?

Older people, usually yes.

Younger people, more often that not, not. Even at 48 I use Kg for my own weight, but those only a half a decade older more routinely use stone/measurements.

Though there is a sizable range of people who use one unit system by default but have a reasonable intuition of the other.

Unlike some things, there are no legal mandates dictating which set of measures to use for this.

Another difference in weight scales: we don't tend to work with just pounds when we use imperial measurements. When a US TV show gives a weight as, for example, “172 pounds”, many will need to do a little mental arithmetic (this may be subconsciously, not actively calculating but the process delaying understanding) to convert to X stone & Y pounds rather than naturally having an intuition of the weight from the single number.

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2ap 7 months ago | parent [-]

I'm a paediatrician. No parent has ever asked me for their baby's weight in kg - they are all pounds and ounces. So much so that I can do this niche conversion almost in my head, at least at the start of the day, as we weigh them in kg.

	▲	finnh 7 months ago \| parent \| next [-]
		What's weird is my pediatrician here in Seattle uses kg for my ~10 year old kids' weights but inches for their heights. Why the kg? They always translate to pounds for discussion, but the record is in kg. It was always pounds and ounces when they were babies though. Not sure when it switched to kg; probably when we switched from "baby specialist" to "standard pediatrician" so around toddler age.
	▲	dspillett 7 months ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		Yes, I've never heard a baby weight given in Kg. But it seems to change when people are old enough to be talking about their own weight.
	▲	bigfatkitten 7 months ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		SI has been the standard for decades in Australia, but people almost always ask for baby weights in pounds and ounces. Adult heights are the other exception, those are often in feet and inches. My 14 year old knows she's 5'2" but her knowledge of imperial measurements doesn't go much further than that.

▲ lostlogin 7 months ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I’ll add tyre pressures - cyclists seem wedded to PSI.

I’m in New Zealand and we use imperial for baby weights, tyre pressure and height. Baking uses some measure like cups (US or imperial?) and teaspoons/tablespoons which I dislike, grams is preferable.

Surely the dumbest though is UK shoe sizing. The increments are barley corns length, a unit of measure which is hilarious. This is for males and children, women’s shoe sizing is apparently US. What a shambles.

I’m sure there are more niche hangovers. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barleycorn_(unit) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoe_size

	▲	bombela 7 months ago \| parent [-]
		Americans also measure gun powder and hard water content in barley corn :) That's what the unit "Grain" is.

▲ rors 7 months ago | parent | prev [-]

The UK government doesn't mandate units for reporting your own weight. The examples listed are required by law.

▲ adolph 7 months ago | parent [-]

> The UK government doesn't mandate units for reporting your own weight.

Wait, you can just use a unit-less value?

  UK Govt Official Weight Form
  Weight: well-nourished

	▲	7 months ago \| parent [-]
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