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( Metric system)
The metric system is a decimalised system of measurement. It exists in several variations, with different choices of base units, though the choice of base units does not affect its day-to-day use. Over the last two centuries, different variants have been considered the metric system. Since the 1960s the International System of Units (SI) ("Système International d'Unités" in French, hence "SI") has been the internationally recognised standard metric system. Metric units are widely used around the world for personal, commercial and scientific purposes. A standard set of prefixes in multiples of 10 may be used to derive larger and smaller units. However, the prefixes for multiples of 1000 are the most commonly used. One goal of the metric system is to have a single unit for any physical quantity; another important one is not needing conversion factors when making calculations with physical quantities. All lengths and distances, for example, are measured in metres, or thousandths of a metre (millimetres), or thousands of metres (kilometres), and so on. There is no profusion of different units with different conversion factors, such as inches, feet, yards, fathoms, rods, chains, furlongs, miles, nautical miles, leagues, etc. Multiples and submultiples are related to the fundamental unit by factors of powers of ten, so that one can convert by simply moving the decimal place 1.234 metres is 1234 millimetres, 0.001234 kilometres, etc. The use of fractions, such as 2/7 of a metre, is not prohibited, but uncommon, as it is generally not necessary. The original metric system was intended to be used with the time units of the French Republican Calendar, but these fell into disuse. Today decimal time is not in everyday use. Submultiples of the second (the microsecond for example) are used in scientific work but for lengths of time greater than a second traditional units, with their non-decimal conversion factors, are more often used than decimal multiples of the second. In the late 18th century, Louis XVI of France charged a group of experts to develop a unified, natural and universal system of measurement to replace the disparate systems then in use. This group, which included such notables as Lavoisier, produced the metric system, which was then adopted by the revolutionary government of France. In the early metric system, there were several fundamental or base units, the grad or grade for angles, the metre for length, the gram for mass and the litre for capacity. These were derived from each other via the properties of natural objects, mainly the Earth and water 1 metre was originally defined as 1/40,000,000 of the polar circumference of the Earth, the kilogram was originally defined as the mass of one litre (or, equivalently, 1 dm³) of water at its melting point (this definition was later revised to specify a temperature of 4 °C). The Celsius temperature scale was derived from the properties of water, with 0 °C being defined as its freezing point and 100 °C being defined as its boiling point under a pressure of one standard atmosphere.
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