this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2025
473 points (98.0% liked)
Technology
76569 readers
2500 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Anything but metric!
1000 horses sounds cooler than 735 electrical pixies a second.
And somehow also more impressive than one Zeus per minute
But horses are measured in hands, average of 16 hands so 16000 hands, 8000 people. That's like 1 electrical pixie per 11 people
Horsepower is a pretty standard way to advertise things in the automotive industry…
But it should be kilowatts. There's no reason not to use the standard metric for power, it's unnecessary fragmentation of figures
Well the metric version is about 1014 PS, but honestly the difference between horsepower and pferdestärke is pretty negligible.
Sadly “745 kW” doesn’t sound as cool as “1000 horsepower.”
What are you on about? The metric unit for power is the Watt
They said anything but metric. The SI unit for power is the Watt, sure, but there are other metric units that are not SI units. One of these is the metric horsepower. 1 metric horsepower is defined as the amount of power required to raise 75kg of mass 1 meter in 1 second against Earth’s gravity. I used pferdestärke because automakers use the “PS” abbreviation in my experience.
This unit exists as an attempt to have a value comparable to historic mechanical horsepower measurements but defined with metric terms.
Obviously Watts are the preferred unit for most things, but the automotive world still likes horsepower. So, metric horsepower.
Colloquially "metric" means the SI-system though. It's not all prescriptively correct terms. Hell, even the name isn't, as the French and English couldn't
So I'm not goanna say your wrong per se. But you're not exactly right either
In what way am I not right? We’re talking about an electric motor for automobiles, and I gave a metric unit that automakers use. What’s more, I also gave it in kW! 🤣
Automakers using a unit doesn't make it metric.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_system
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/colloquial
Got it. Metric horsepower isn’t metric. Forgive me for thinking a recognized metric unit is metric. And also for not putting the kW conversion in bold or something.
🙄
So you're just gonna ignore everything that's not inline with what you're saying? Yawn. Perhaps try rereading my comments.
Oh I read your pedantry. You just really don’t want to say, “Oh, interesting, I didn’t realize there was ever a metric horsepower.”
Lol, you're the one who's arguing youre right, despite me clearly stressing that I know that if we're superanal pedants you could technically make the argument that "metric system" can also refer to non-SI units which use decimal prefixes.
That a lone doesn't mean you we're right. See that "metric system" link there? Give it a click, would you, and then rethink on who's being pedantic.
You haven't told me anything interesting. I'm well aware of things like the attempt of France to change the time to powers a decimal system as well. They didn't. Time is still in SI-units and that system is colloquially known as THE METRIC SYSTEM.
Like I said, you're not exactly wrong, per se. (But you definitely are now, being such an annoying pedant while ignoring the very simple points I made.)
I’m not ignoring your point. I’m saying your point is irrelevant. This is a unit in use today, with “metric” in its English name. I don’t care that it isn’t part of what is colloquially called “the metric system.” That wasn’t the point.
But don’t worry, next time I think to myself, “I could reply with a fun bit of trivia I know and make a comment that is both correct and also not at all what the person I’m replying to means or expects,” I’ll first ask myself, “What would Dasus say?”
And you're wrong.
Just because some niche unit uses metric prefixes doesn't mean that that unit is "in the metric system" as language is used.
Learn to use language pls.
Weird how when you open that "metric system" link your pedantry is nowhere to be seen, almost as if by and large "metric" refers to the SI-system, isn't it? Oh I'm sorry, you can't answer that with "yes", because it would mean that you stop pretending like you don't know what I mean, which you simply can't do.
Weird how I never once said metric horsepower was part of “The Metric System” and how I also gave the kW value in my very first post.
It’s not that I don’t know what you mean, my friend, it’s that I am not using the word metric the same way you are. That’s the whole point. You can say colloquial all you want! I never disagreed! You can talk about by and large all you want! You’re not wrong!
Metric horsepower is a metric unit, it’s in the name. Whether it’s an SI-unit or part of “the metric system” is completely irrelevant. I am technically correct, the best kind of correct.
I am shocked we’re arguing about this. Again, I apologize for trying to have fun on the internet, I promise it won’t happen again.
"Well the metric version is"
Oh, so you're just reconfirming you don't speak English. Ok. Best of luck, we can try again in a few years. I can link you some Simple English channels if you'd like?
🤣😂🤣
That sounds very dependent on the language. I've never read/heard "PS" as horsepower before. Let's just use kW ffs.
Watt? 🤔
Mitchell and Webb - Four Candles