So random

In 1735 a group of scientists from the French Royal Academy of Sciences ventured off to Peru, to reach a stretch of earth, measuring about 300 kilometers, that ran from Yarouqui to Quito. Their idea was to use the line, part of a meridian, as a basis for triangulating earth distances, in order to derive the circumference of the earth.

Well the entire expedition was a nightmare. People went missing, some died and others ran away, whilst sceptics sat back in places like Paris and London to ponder why its was all so necessary when any meridian would do.

Anyway, scientists did eventually establish the circumference of the earth. Just to top it all the French Academy then had the brightest of ideas - they derived the metric system.

Originally the meter was to be 1/10millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole, although the true measure has been subject to some variations through the years. Nowadays they have a purer measure based on the speed of light through a vacuum, which is a constant (ask Einstein, he will agree I am sure) 299,792,458 meters per second. The reciprocal gives us the time it would take to travel a distance of one meter, thus enabling us to use that time interval to precisely measure 1 meter.

Once they had the basic unit of distance worked out, they then got to the real elegance of metrication - they aligned the basic measure to multiples of ten, to derive the centimeter (1/100th), millimeter (1/1000th) and the kilometer (1000x), etc. Of course it didn't stop there. They also derived the kilogram, being the mass of 1 litre of water at sea level and they derived cubic capacity, or liters, based on the meter.

The need for standards goes back to antiquity. Goliath was so many cubits high and it was useful for scribes to record that, although they could have just said he was flipping big. During the great diamond rushes, the Karob seed was used as a standard weight, but it was not so perfect (resulting in arbitrary manipulation of values), so they developed the Carat as the standard unit of weight (Carat is a derivation of Karob). The nautical speed of ships at sea was also derived by measuring how quickly the wash of a ship would swallow up a rope comprising equally spaced knots, resulting in the nautical term we now know as knots.

Okay so life would not work too well without yardsticks and measures. We would never have achieved what we have achieved in science without such measures. We all agree that a standard is vital, except of course when it comes to measuring the value of a human life - then we get all arbitrary. Someone even developed the philosphy of relativism, a root of modern humanism, which describes human ethos and value systems in relative, not absolute terms. It also dispenses with a need for God or any accountability to such an absolute and it thus reduces human norms and values to, well how long is a piece of string?

How can that be sound thinking? The entire universe is mathematically and empirically constant and robust in its design, suggesting a very ordered, logical designer. Sadly, by virtue of the lapse of wisdom that humanity has unfortunately suffered, all such rationality is suspended when it comes to people. So righteousness is just a feeling and the ten commandments are but ten suggestions, whilst heaven and hell are just classes within the continuum of human consciousness. Wow, what a muddled set of ideas - methinks I would far rather know where I stand and what is required of my life, because humanism simply lacks any definition or backbone. Most notably, in watering down the absolutes of God it denies the need for divine grace and thus robs humanity of God's greatest gift - absolutely, unmerited favor, or grace.   

(c) Peter Eleazar @ http://www.4u2live.net/