For more context, sample reference materials from the NIST reference catalogue are not meant to be exceptionally high purity examples of the sample -- SRMs are usually commercially-produced products. The real value is that each sample comes with a datasheet with incredibly detailed and accurate measurements that are (as you said) used for calibration of measuring devices in industrial settings. To quote a Veritasium video about the topic from a few years ago[1], "the thing you're paying for is not the peanut butter, its the knowledge of exactly what is in the peanut butter".
I wouldn’t put it past people in my country to buy it just to show off wealth :/
I have recently realized we imported the western world in the most superficial ways.
artisinal 2 hours ago [-]
This is why we should ditch Celsius for Kelvin. I never liked how we coupled 0 and 100 to where water freezes and boils under certain conditions. Kelvin doesn't rely on non-invariant reference points.
warmdarksea 39 minutes ago [-]
this is actually why i like fahrenheit the most... 0F is "really cold" and 100F is "really hot", whereas in celsius 0C is "kind of cold" and 100C is "uninhabitable". it makes sense for the 0-100 range to be reserved for temperatures frequently encountered in our habitat as humans i think...
clickety_clack 31 seconds ago [-]
I actually came around to Fahrenheit for the exact same reason. 0°F and 100°F are kind of the top and bottom of the temperature range I’m going to be experiencing and anything outside that is waaay too hot or cold. In Celsius a large portion of people have to flip to negative numbers regularly during the normal year, and everything between 45°C and 100°C is completely unused.
al_borland 18 minutes ago [-]
This has always been my primary argument in favor of Fahrenheit. It makes sense for humans, which is all a majority of the population really cares about. In addition, it's more granular. Sometimes turning the thermostat up or down by 1C could be too much, where 1F is just right.
In science and math, I can see where having round numbers for commonly used temperatures would be useful, but if 0C and 100C are the only places that happens, it's not that hard to memorize 2 numbers.
wongarsu 31 minutes ago [-]
Celsius maps nicely to the temperatures observed in a typical Finnish sauna. 100C is among the highest typical sauna temperatures (very relaxing in dry air), and afterwards you cool off with water around 0C
Also, having 100C as water temp for black tee and 80 for green tee is nice to remember
12 minutes ago [-]
ajmurmann 35 minutes ago [-]
This makes sense if weather is the main focus. For things like cooking Celsius is great though.
TylerE 29 minutes ago [-]
Also for things like hvac temps Celsius is rather too coarse where as 1F is right around the perceivable difference.
SketchySeaBeast 3 minutes ago [-]
There's nothing stopping the use of decimal points for Celsius. Though there's also nothing stopping decimal points in Fahrenheit, the rare instance where an imperial sub-unit doesn't make things go fucky.
Guvante 48 minutes ago [-]
You want numbers to be understandable and K produces illogical numbers.
(There is a reason it is common to drop the century when talking about years, humans are less skilled at numbers over 100)
And I know temperatures in Fahrenheit go higher but it is common to refer to Phoenix as "over 100" even when it's high can peak over 120.
thaumasiotes 9 minutes ago [-]
> (There is a reason it is common to drop the century when talking about years,
Yep.
> humans are less skilled at numbers over 100)
No, the reason is that the century is constant and therefore carries no information. Where the century isn't constant, it never gets dropped.
zinckiwi 29 minutes ago [-]
That’s 02025 thinking.
analog31 58 minutes ago [-]
I think that both the Celsius and Fahrenheit scales are now defined in terms of Kelvin and a formula. Most if not all of the units of measure are no longer related to their history except for an agreement to make the new units match the old ones at some point.
Nothing screams freedom more than using ancient terms like horsepower and measuring tires in inches and percentages.
The other day I heard an American talk about a TV being 65 inches. Took me a while to understand they had a 165 centimeter diagonal television.
xgulfie 56 minutes ago [-]
Kelvin does still rely on each degree being 1% of the way between freezing and boiling so it kinda does rely on a variant reference point
chermi 52 minutes ago [-]
The reference point is the triple point, and invariant.
spullara 1 hours ago [-]
A US gallon of deuterium water costs roughly $2,600 to $3,800, while a gallon of pure tritium water (super-heavy water) would cost about $44 million.
BizarroLand 26 minutes ago [-]
Makes me want to go to the ocean and start filtering out water somehow.
rwmj 42 minutes ago [-]
Interesting article but left me wondering why they don't use H1_2 O16 as the "standard water"? Surely you can make that (relatively) easily in a centrifuge by spinning out the lightest fraction of water.
cactusplant7374 26 minutes ago [-]
How does the water taste?
sandworm101 1 hours ago [-]
As specialized world-class lab supplies and reagents go, that is not very expensive. Stuff like pure Xe (for space thrusters) can be more by mass.
pack_stimulus 2 hours ago [-]
Loved reading this. Thank you!
dorianmariecom 50 minutes ago [-]
gallon is not a si unit ;)
alanfalcon 2 hours ago [-]
[dead]
Rendered at 18:51:12 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
[1]: https://youtu.be/esQyYGezS7c?t=226
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3103
https://www.nist.gov/news-events/news/2020/02/nist-releases-...
Perhaps you would prefer some standard issue meat.
https://www.sigmaaldrich.com/US/en/product/sial/nist1546a
https://www.sigmaaldrich.com/US/en/product/sial/nist2781
I have recently realized we imported the western world in the most superficial ways.
In science and math, I can see where having round numbers for commonly used temperatures would be useful, but if 0C and 100C are the only places that happens, it's not that hard to memorize 2 numbers.
Also, having 100C as water temp for black tee and 80 for green tee is nice to remember
(There is a reason it is common to drop the century when talking about years, humans are less skilled at numbers over 100)
And I know temperatures in Fahrenheit go higher but it is common to refer to Phoenix as "over 100" even when it's high can peak over 120.
Yep.
> humans are less skilled at numbers over 100)
No, the reason is that the century is constant and therefore carries no information. Where the century isn't constant, it never gets dropped.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_customary_units
The other day I heard an American talk about a TV being 65 inches. Took me a while to understand they had a 165 centimeter diagonal television.