Today is World Metrology Day. No, you fools it is not about the weather, although judging by how metrology is flagged up as a misspelling on this blog engine, that might be a common misconception. Metrology is all about measurement and today is an aniversary of the first important international convention on metrology, The International Treaty on the Metre, which was signed on May 20, 1875. An interesting aside is what is significant about this particular anniversary (Happy 134) to have a World Metrology Day?

In the UK, there has always been scepticism about what is always referred as the “metric system” with metric seen as some strange foreign (almost certainly French and therefore doubly suspicious), counterintuitive and possibly demonic methodology. For a timeline on the definition of the metre, see this page at NIST. I thought John Pethica (an old friend who is now Chief Scientist at the NPL) was very good at answering the leading questions put to him on the Today programme this morning when they featured WMetD. Unfortunately, the only hook the journalists felt they could apply to this story was references to so called metric martyrs. John gave a very good answer, which effectively said that it doesn’t matter what units are used locally but that we need common agreed standards to ensure trade occurs fairly.

Measurement and precision is very important for the understanding of science but the topic is usually regarded as rather dull and certainly does not get the attention given to the discoveries of (or reinterpretations of discoveries of) small proto-primate fossils. Hence, the fact that today was of sufficient note that it got a mention on British Radio News and Current Affairs should be celebrated, as well of course as the day itself.