Hey, so if a gallon of water weighs 8 pounds...

[Guaranteed]

That means a quart of water weighs two pounds, right?

And then a pint weighs....one pound, right? Which is 16 fluid ounces?

So 16 fluid ounces of water weighs 16 ounces......hmmm...

1 fl oz. H20 = 1 oz. H20

That's almost metric! Maybe there IS a method to the madness, after all.

Man. A pint of water weighs one pound. 16 ounces. It almost makes too much sense.

[Midlodemocrat]

1. Did someone get a metric/english conversion unit for Christmas?

[Guaranteed]

2. LOL nah I was just thinking, because I'd had it in

my head for years now that a gallon of water weighs 8 lbs. But I never broke it down into smaller volumes...it all makes sense now. :)

[Midlodemocrat]

3. LOL.

:thumbsup:

Peace to you in 2007, BGL.

[KitchenWitch]

9. Glad you finally joined us!

:silly:

[mzteris]

32. didya know we have a group

for people just like you right here on DU?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=387


:rofl:

[Fuzz]

4. But did you ever look at your hand?

I mean really look at your hand, man? It's awesome and complicated and moves in such a distinct way. And the colors, the beautiful colors!

;)

[Guaranteed]

5. Yeah. It's funny cuz it's true.

I am fascinated by my hands. Seriously.

Everything I do is with these two things on the end of my arms, with four fingers on top and one on the side, that comes around...

[deucemagnet]

8. They call them fingers, but I never see them fing. n/t

[JVS]

11. etymologically speaking they're connected to a verb meaning to catch/gather

A hint of this can be seen by the fact that in German, "The Catcher in the Rye" is "Der Faenger im Roggen"

Grimm tells us
" FINGER, m. digitus, durch alle unsere sprachen gehend, goth. figgrs, ahd. finkar, fingar, mhd. vinger, ags. engl. finger, alts. fingar, nl. vinger, fries. finger, altn. fîngr, schw. dän. finger, wofür in den urverwandten sprachen kein ausdruck nahe liegt, nur einzelne sich von ferne heranziehen lassen. ein merkwürdiges zeugnis von der alten abgrenzung unsers idioms.
mit finger unmittelbar in der wurzel verwandt wurde schon sp. 1311 fangen dargestellt, d. h. ein der reduplicativform fangen fieng vorangegangnes, längst erloschnes fingen fang, wie auch andere reduplicationen auf ältere ablaute zurückschlieszen lassen. geht ein eben besprochnes fingeln alt hinauf, so läge darin bestätigung des fingen, und das lat. pangere, compingere entspräche. dasz seinem begriffe nach finger aus fangen herfliesze ergibt sich von allen seiten"

http://germazope.uni-trier.de/Projects/WBB/woerterbuecher/dwb/wbgui?lemid=GF04360

Fangen has an article here
http://germazope.uni-trier.de/Projects/WBB/woerterbuecher/dwb/wbgui?lemid=GF00807

So although Fingers don't fing in English, they do in the Germanic languages from which English came.

[deucemagnet]

15. Damn! The things you learn on DU!

Fingers fing in German! :rofl:

[bicentennial_baby]

13. How odd...I said that this morning...

:crazy:

[ghostsofgiants]

33. Oh, there they go!

[BrotherBuzz]

6. A pint's a pound the world 'round unless you're....

in Great Britain where the pint is twenty ounces. :shrug:

[JVS]

7. approximately but not quite

1 pint = 473 ml according to my can of miller lite
1 pound = 453.59237 grams according to google

So the system is askew

[Connonym]

10. This discussion came up during Xmas baking

Not with liquid but with gumdrops of all things. The gumdrop cookie recipe called for 2 cups of chopped gumdrops - my sister felt that 2 cups of gumdrups meant a 16 oz (by weight) bag. It was my contention that 2 cups of gumdrops by volume didn't necessarily mean 16 oz by weight because the gumdrops wouldn't be solidly packing the measuring cup. We never were able to come to a final conclusion on the correct answer.

BTW, gumdrop cookies aren't as gross as they sound.

[JVS]

12. I think you're technically right, but you sister's method would lead to...

cookies with more gumdrops which would probably be tastier

[eyepaddle]

14. Two cups of gumdrops (if you removed all the air)

would weigh more than 16 oz. The ounce/ounce thing only works for water. An ounce of air weighs much less. Gallons/quatrs/pints/ounces etc are measurements of volume, tons/pounds/ounces are weight. I'm pretty sure the weight measurements are defined by what that volume of water would weigh.

But hey, with gumdrop cookies I say toss 'em in!
:)

[conscious evolution]

21. Huh?!?!

'The ounce/ounce thing only works for water. An ounce of air weighs much less.'

This reminds me of the old question What's heavier a ton of bricks or a ton of feathers.

An ounce is an ounce.

[Left Is Write]

25. Nope - fluid ounces measure volume; regular ounces measure weight.

[conscious evolution]

26. Oh

It sure is easy to get confused when comparing fluid volumns and wieghts.

Here's one for you.Which is heavier: an ounce of gold or an ounce of lead?

[Rabrrrrrr]

27. The answer to that depends on if you mean fluid ounce or ounce of weight

[conscious evolution]

29. By wieght

There is a correct answer to this.I know cause it got me 5 points extra credit on a physics exam!

[Left Is Write]

30. Tricky, tricky. Gold is measured in troy ounces, heavier than regular ounces.

[conscious evolution]

31. we have a winner!!

Troy ounces,IIRC,are about three grams heavier.

[Rabrrrrrr]

34. Only by jewelers and investors. Not by scientists.

[Rabrrrrrr]

28. eyepaddle was unclear in use of ounces -

I think it's safe to say that he meant a fluid ounce of air weighs less.

English measurements aren't very good, because we don't actually have a measurement for mass, only weight (which is a mass being acted upon by a force; which force, generally, is gravity; but also always includes pressure and temperature).

Metric has a term for mass - grams. Something that is one gram is always one gram, whether it's at 1 degree kelvin on 900 atmospheres on the surface of a neutron star, or sitting on your table top.

[eyepaddle]

37. As long as I'm resurrecting this thread

Isn't the English measurement of mass something called the slug? I know in my other post I talked about "ounces" and grams being equivalent when I should said "ounces" are sorta like Newtons. In my mind I always think of a Newton being about equal to the weight of an apple--which makes me wonder how friggin' big is a slug?

[Rabrrrrrr]

38. Yes, we do have the slug. But no one uses it, and few know of it.

So I was being a bit untruthful in how I said that we don't have one. I should have said we don't have a commonly known one.

I will also say that few people know the difference between weight and mass to begin with.

A slug is the amount of mass that a one pound force will accelerate at 1 foot/second/second, which is about 32.2 pounds.

A Newton, on the other hand, is a force, not a measurement of weight or mass so it can't be equal to an apple. An approximately 3.5 ounce apple will have a force of 1 newton acting on it by gravity (3.5 ounces is about 0.1 kg, and g=9.8 m/s/s, so it comes to 1 Newton (approx.))

[eyepaddle]

35. Oops I should read the thread and not just reply to stuff in myDU

D'oh! :)

fluid ounces and "ounces" a pint is 16 fluid ounces (size or volume) and a pound is 16 ounces. A pint of water weighs one pound (that is the defining standard)

Think of it like this fill a gallon container with water it will hold eight pounds of water, now fill that same container with lead, it will weigh substantially more than eight pounds--but it is still a gallon in size.

As an Ameican I actually prefer the English system of measurement, it after all is what I am used to, but things like naming (and spelling) two totally different units the same is one of the many areas of confusionwhich lead to the creation of the metric system. In the metric system fluid ounces correspond to milliliters and "ounces" to grams.

[puerco-bellies]

16. Back in the day we used to call pints of beer "pounders"

I never made the connection.. Chock it up to Anchor - Old Foghorn Ale. Brain Damage by the pint.

[JVS]

19. Did you think it was because they helped you get pounded?

[puerco-bellies]

20. Well, ya, I did.

Yep, good-times.

[AllegroRondo]

39. but doesnt beer weigh less than water?

because of the alcohol?

[leftofthedial]

17. a pint is a pound

the world around

[Rabrrrrrr]

18. You are very, very wrong. A gallon (by volume) of water at STP and 0 elevation

is about 8.34 pounds.


Also, your "theory", if true, would still only work at 0 feet elevation, standard temperature, and standard pressure.

Otherwise, your one ounce (by weight) of water is NOT once fluid ounce in volume.

One ounce (by weight) of ice at 0 elevation and standard pressure is about 1.1 fluid ounces in volume.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

23. Picky, picky.

But how about jet fuel (Jet-A), which weighs only 6.7 lbs./gal. at standard temperature (15 C) and standard pressure (29.92" Hg) at sea level? And jet fuel makes horrible ice cubes, too.

[Rabrrrrrr]

24. Or one fluid ounce of aerogel, or of a neutron star

[ElboRuum]

22. Not a coincidence, this was intentional.

[idgiehkt]

36. so how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

and what does it mean to 'chuck wood', anyway? Does that turn this into a sex thread?

[eppur_se_muova]

40. I believe one cubic foot of water weighs 1,000 ounces ...

but only if you use "Brunswick" feet, which are not the same as modern "English" feet. Note that 1024 oz = 64 pints = 32 qt = 8 gal, so that would mean only 2.4% difference between a fluid oz and an oz avoirdupois, and the same error in a "pint a pound", or 8 lbs/gal.

So people were trying to "rationalize" units long before the French Revolution. (Read "Measuring America" for some interesting background on the veritable zoo of old English measurements, and how the USA *just* missed out on being one of the FIRST nations to adopt the Metric system!)