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computer calculator for fast metric to imperial conversion
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<blockquote data-quote="Jay Barracato" data-source="post: 108005" data-attributes="member: 24"><p>Re: computer calculator for fast metric to imperial conversion</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Drew, it is really not a lot more work to do it manually. The key is just to remember that for area you square the conversion and for volume you cube the conversion.</p><p></p><p>I think there is a lot to be said for working it out manually. A story i tell my students is when I worked in research we were doing trace level measurements often down to picograms/liter. It was necessary to convert the output of our instrumental analysis (which had a number of steps) to a final amount. The three of us in the lab would often debate what level we were actually measuring at. The person to win the debate was usually the first person to stop estimating and actually write out the conversion.</p><p></p><p>A second story comes from teaching the topic. i have had a number of students through the years write programs/spreadsheets/apps/calculator functions or whatever the current tech was. It became clear that anyone who understood conversions enough to write the program, didn't need the program, and those who didn't understand conversions couldn't get any better answers when given a program to do it.</p><p></p><p>I hate to say it, but I have found single mistakes in conversions when peer reviewing scientific papers that totally changed the results and the conclusions based on those results.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jay Barracato, post: 108005, member: 24"] Re: computer calculator for fast metric to imperial conversion Drew, it is really not a lot more work to do it manually. The key is just to remember that for area you square the conversion and for volume you cube the conversion. I think there is a lot to be said for working it out manually. A story i tell my students is when I worked in research we were doing trace level measurements often down to picograms/liter. It was necessary to convert the output of our instrumental analysis (which had a number of steps) to a final amount. The three of us in the lab would often debate what level we were actually measuring at. The person to win the debate was usually the first person to stop estimating and actually write out the conversion. A second story comes from teaching the topic. i have had a number of students through the years write programs/spreadsheets/apps/calculator functions or whatever the current tech was. It became clear that anyone who understood conversions enough to write the program, didn't need the program, and those who didn't understand conversions couldn't get any better answers when given a program to do it. I hate to say it, but I have found single mistakes in conversions when peer reviewing scientific papers that totally changed the results and the conclusions based on those results. [/QUOTE]
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