Systems of Measurement in World-Building

A quick essay that's been living for too long in my brain.

Measurement in World-Building

During the initial drafting of Transference, one of the (many) things that stymied me was a concern over what measurement system to use. Of course, there were much bigger things to figure out, but it’s funny how those small, idiosyncratic choices can really slow you down. I even went so far as to change everything from imperial to metric in one of the revisions, to which my wife replied with a confused “ew?”, and then reverted it back in another subsequent revision.

Since then, an idea of how measurement system choice informs and affects reader experience has been percolating in the back of my head. Maybe that’s because I’m still a damn engineer at heart and it’s hard to drop the units entirely. I decided finally to write this essay to explore some of those ideas, in the hopes that maybe it resonates with others, or at least it clarifies things for me.

So, why is it important? Of course, there are many more viable descriptions of temperature, height, weight, distance, etc. than just measurement units, and I think it can be a viable approach to forgo their use all together. But if you are planning to use them at all, they must be consistent. Or, they probably should be. Whatever your choice, it can certainly have an effect on the verisimilitude of your story, and can either pull some readers away from the text, or if done well, work as another element of world building to pull them closer.

In the following sections, I’ve tried to pull out what I think might be the most common answers to this question, to discuss where I think they might be used best. Of course this is all personal opinion, and a lot of it is probably bullshit, so take it with a pinch of salt.

The Do Nothing Approach

This is always my favorite way to solve a problem. Just pretend it isn’t there, never mention it, sweep it under the rug, and voila, it disappears. I think it is an absolutely valid approach to not reference a measurement system at all, but it might be limited to certain types of stories and characters that use more descriptive language. The shorter the piece, and certainly the more removed from reality the setting is, the easier this is to get away with, I think.

If you are considering this approach, also consider how many times you’ll be describing things by comparison, and if that will be annoying to the reader.

The Time Machine Approach

There have been so many wacky units of measurement dreamed up through our history that you don’t have to dig deep to find a full way of explaining the world in absolutely strange ways, like how many hands a horse is (still used, I believe), or how many stone something weighs. Things like this add realness to your story, especially for early period pieces or things seeking that vibe (looking at you, high fantasy). It does require some decent legwork to make sure you have all your usages correct, and for the pedantic reader, in the correct timeline to each other.

The Book Marketing Approach

I think there is a very real justification in choosing your units based on the target market, or setting, of your book. As a reader who grew up with the Imperial system (and understands how silly it is), I have almost no physical understanding of metric units. I cannot quickly conceptualize how hot 30C is, or how tall 10 meters is, and doing the mental math takes me out of the story. But also, if I read a book with British English word spellings, or something set in most places in Europe, and an Imperial unit was used, it would feel very out of place. There are some landmines here though, as some places (England) use a confusing patchwork of Metric and Imperial units. If your story is set near the present day, this is all very worth considering.

The Imperial vs. Metric Approach

This is probably the section that will apply to the majority of stories set in the far future, and certainly the one that I’ve had the most thought over. Firstly, I believe that it is equally relevant to use Imperial or Metric units in far future fiction (and a good decider can be the audience you’re writing for). However, I think that a society derived from each of those base units communicates a different thing to the reader.

The constant base 10 of Metric units, and their derivations from each other, make them more logically consistent. I think these can fit well for a society, setting, or tone that is more scientifically driven, potentially more militaristic or regimented. Especially for things like hard science fiction, the Metric system is the clear winner for me. It can be made more esoteric by adding in units like Kelvin or Rankine.

In opposition to this, the haphazard definition of Imperial units, their unstructured names, and amalgamated historical context fit a much different world. To me these are the messy futures; the Blade Runners, the Neuromancers, or the war-torn dystopian settings. The ones where, in their formation, humanity clearly did not have their shit together to align on a more clean unit system.

The You Make The Rules Approach

So take everything above, and throw it in the bin. I think you could, if it was important to your world-building and story, mix all of this together into an approach that implemented many different forms of measurement. You could, for instance, for characters from different ranks of society use different forms of measurement. These could be indications of class, rank, intelligence, schooling, etc. This requires a lot more forethought, but for the right story, could be a really neat trick.

In Conclusion

I hope that I have maybe convinced you, at least somewhat, that your measurement system should be a considered piece of your world-building. Or at least if you’ve made it this far, you have a greater idea of the weird stuff that keeps me awake at night. Let me know what you think in the comments!