# When Units Collide **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 16, 2006, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038 "2006-05-16T23:03:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/21 "2006-05-17T14:45:45Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > There would be a unit called the Schrodinger, but the act of trying to measure using them would affect the object being measured. > > But if you take as given that it should be a measure, I’ll bet there are a few people who he did and did not meet. 😛 In that case, I want my car speedo calibrated in Heisenbergs… inaccurately of course (or I’ll never know where I am). 😃 ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/22 "2006-05-17T14:58:51Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > There would be a unit called the Schrodinger, but the act of trying to measure using them would affect the object being measured. > > But if you take as given that it should be a measure, I’ll bet there are a few people who he did and did not meet. 😛 Snork. That reminds me of the Cecil article most deserving of a permanent place in the cult classic hall of fame. In my opinion Cecil’s work is every bit of genius as [the Monty Python Philosopher Song](http://www.adelaide.edu.au/library/guide/hum/philosophy/philos_song.html). [The story of Schroedinger’s cat (an epic poem)](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html). ---
**Author:** ![spingears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@spingears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spingears)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/23 "2006-05-17T15:08:37Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > BTW the question the column was meandering its way to addressing was: is it possible to stir water enough to generate sufficient heat by internal friction to boil it? Perhaps using a Tesla turbine like device, well insulated, and a large power input. [Underlining added.] Doesn’t microwave heating do essentially the same thing by increasing the energy level of the water molecules? ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/24 "2006-05-17T15:30:21Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > So I have 0.166 milliHenries? Neat. 🙂 You have 1/1000 of a wife? ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/25 "2006-05-17T15:44:01Z")
> [@UncleBeer](#): > > Snork. That reminds me of the Cecil article most deserving of a permanent place in the cult classic hall of fame. In my opinion Cecil’s work is every bit of genius as [the Monty Python Philosopher Song](http://www.adelaide.edu.au/library/guide/hum/philosophy/philos_song.html). > > [The story of Schroedinger’s cat (an epic poem)](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html). One of my favorites: Schroedinger’s doggerel. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/26 "2006-05-17T17:17:35Z")
> [@scr4](#): > > You have 1/1000 of a wife? :smack: frickin’ decimal points. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Valgard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7feea3/32.png) [@Valgard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Valgard)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/27 "2006-05-17T19:28:42Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > There would be a unit called the Schrodinger, but the act of trying to measure using them would affect the object being measured. > > But if you take as given that it should be a measure, I’ll bet there are a few people who he did and did not meet. 😛 There was a contest in Omni (or was it Games) magazine years ago to come up with similar units. I remember a few: 1 Pentacost = 5 Holocausts 2000 pounds of Chinese soup = Won Ton and other such groaners. I had a physics professor in college who drew a picture of a short centipede and asked the class what it was. “A centipede?” “No, it’s a centimeter”. He then flipped it upside down so the legs were sticking up. “Now it’s a dying centimeter…urg!” (say it out loud and if you groan you are a geek). ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/28 "2006-05-17T19:47:11Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > It’s mathematically possible they met each other (19 year overlap). Except that Newton never left England and I’m fairly sure offhand that Pascal never crossed the Channel in the opposite direction. Furthermore, Newton spent his first eighteen years in provincial obscurity, venturing little beyond Woolsthorpe and Grantham, then the next year as a lowly first-year undergrad at Cambridge. Had they by some chance met, then it’d be the sort of story that’d have appealed to Newton’s early 18th century contemporaries and been recorded by the likes of Stukeley and Voltaire. No such meeting was remembered. > [@dtilque](#): > > The curie was named after Pierre, not Marie Good catch. And relevant in that I’d estimate that there’s a fair chance he also met Weber, Hertz and Siemens, but it’s seems very unlikely that she could have. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/29 "2006-05-17T20:13:35Z")
A couple of other units that might be mentioned are the [einstein](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein_(unit)) (1879-1955), and the darwin (1809-1882), the unit of evolutionary change (defined as 2.718 units of change/million years). ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/30 "2006-05-17T20:55:21Z")
Malacandra: > [@](#): > > In that case, I want my car speedo calibrated in Heisenbergs Are you certain you want that? ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/31 "2006-05-17T21:16:40Z")
> [@Sage Rat](#): > > There’s a unit called “The Henry?” > > Would that be a unit of wives, perchance? It’s a unit of electrical inductance, a measurement of the energy that can be stored in the expanding magnetic field around a coil through which a changing current is passing. I think. I now think there should be a unit called the Davy, and I keep wondering what it would measure. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/32 "2006-05-17T21:52:12Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > I now think there should be a unit called the Davy, and I keep wondering what it would measure. Perhaps anti-gravy? > [@](#): > > Sir Humphrey Davy > Abominated gravy. > He lived in the odium > Of having discovered sodium. Edmund Clerihew Bentley (1875-1956) ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/33 "2006-05-17T22:36:27Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Malacandra: > > \ > > Are you certain you want that? Of course. Though I may perforce revise my opinion when I get it. 10[sup]3[/sup] whales = 1 kilowhale 10[sup]12[/sup] pins = 1 terapin $10[sup]-5[/sup] = 1 millicent …etc ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2006, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/34 "2006-05-17T23:37:29Z")
Yes, but did Mendoza, Uecker, John, and Schneid ever meet? Batting averages under a certain point are under the Mendoza line. If you are as high in the stadium as you can go, you’re in the Bob Uecker seats. Tommy John gave his name to a unit of surgery. “Poor guy, he’s had two Tommy Johns.” If you score your first point, you are “off the Schneid.” I will skip a step and admit that I don’t know who Mendoza and Schneid are/were. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2006, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/35 "2006-05-18T04:25:26Z")
> [@AskNott](#): > > I will skip a step and admit that I don’t know who Mendoza and Schneid are/were. [Mario Mendoza](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Mendoza), a shortstop in the 1970s. Schneid is short for _schneider_, and entered baseball from the game of gin, where it means to prevent an opponent from gaining any points. Schneider is German/Yiddish for tailor, the sense apparently being to cut someone off from scoring. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2006, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/36 "2006-05-18T05:00:57Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > 10[sup]3[/sup] whales = 1 kilowhale > > 10[sup]12[/sup] pins = 1 terapin > > $10[sup]-5[/sup] = 1 millicent > > …etc The Helen is the unit of beauty, defined such that 1.000 is necessary to launch a thousand ships. So: 1 milli-Helen is the beauty necessary to launch 1 ship. -1 milli-Helen is the ugliness necessary to sink 1 ship. … etc Thanks to all for their replies; it’s interesting how there was a golden period of unit-naming in the mid-19th century and consequently many of the much smaller pool of individuals involved in science at the time did meet. ---
**Author:** ![TJdude825](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@TJdude825](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJdude825)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2006, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/37 "2006-05-18T05:22:27Z")
I’ve always thought it was unfair that Einstein didn’t get a unit. Of course, I never thought to actually check if he did or not. Ignorance fought. I always assumed the lumen was from the Greek or Latin or something for “light” but then I suppose that would be “luc-” not “lum-”… interesting. ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2006, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/38 "2006-05-18T12:47:00Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Schneid is short for _schneider_, and entered baseball from the game of gin, where it means to prevent an opponent from gaining any points. Schneider is German/Yiddish for tailor, the sense apparently being to cut someone off from scoring. David Feldman said that “off the schneider” means to actually score. He explained that a “schneider” is actually a cloth-cutter, so to get “off the schneider” means to be promoted, as it were; in this case, from loser to contender. (This can be found in _Who Put the Butter in Butterfly_, his book about language.) Which makes no sense, because I’d always been told that a _schneider_ was a tailor and had never heard the cloth-cutting meaning until I read Feldman’s book. For that matter, I’ve never heard the phrase “off the schneider” actually used except in discussions about the phrase. Unless there is an alternate meaning, in which case never mind. Robin ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2006, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/39 "2006-05-18T13:41:43Z")
> [@MsRobyn](#): > > David Feldman said that “off the schneider” means to actually score. He explained that a “schneider” is actually a cloth-cutter, so to get “off the schneider” means to be promoted, as it were; in this case, from loser to contender. (This can be found in _Who Put the Butter in Butterfly_, his book about language.) > > Which makes no sense, because I’d always been told that a _schneider_ was a tailor and had never heard the cloth-cutting meaning until I read Feldman’s book. For that matter, I’ve never heard the phrase “off the schneider” actually used except in discussions about the phrase. Unless there is an alternate meaning, in which case never mind. > > Robin The English phrase might be a partial translation of the German phrase _aus dem Schneider_ (literally, out of the/off the tailor). The general meaning of the phrase is being “off the hook” for something (i.e. not having to fear adverse consequences) or having achieved enough, and the specific meaning in the [Skat](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skat) card game is scoring more than 30 points. _Schneider_ in German literally means cutter but in fact means tailor. A mere cloth cutter would be a _Zuschneider_. The explanations that I read for the _aus dem Schneider_ phrase were essentially that tailors were reputed to be slight, unmuscular, even crippled people (who were too weak for more energetic work), and that _Schneider_ was used to refer, by extension, to a slight person and, by extension from that, to a small quantity. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2006, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038/40 "2006-05-18T20:49:33Z")
Quoth **Colibri** : > [@](#): > > and the darwin (1809-1882), the unit of evolutionary change (defined as 2.718 units of change/million years). Could you elaborate a bit on this? The definition as you state it here seems to be both circular and inconsistent. The 2.718 suggests to me that there’s something exponential going on, but I’m not sure how that would manifest. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-units-collide/357038.md?page=3)