The most interesting units of measurement involve mixing precise scientific formality with absurd references, cultural in-jokes or impractical scales. Here are some unusual or culturally concocted units of measurement:
Beard-second
Playful unit of length. How much the average beard grows per second: ~ 5 nanometres
Bee’s Dick
Australian term for a very short distance. [Ed: Not so short, says the bee.]
Canard
A unit of quackery created by blogger Andy Lewis in the need for a fractional index measuring pseudoscience. The scale is from 0 to 10, with 0 being “no quackery” and 10 being “complete quackery”.
Donkey power
This facetious engineering unit is defined as 250 watts – about a third of a horsepower.
Hand
This one is real. Measures the height of horses. One hand is equivalent to approximately 10 cm (4 inches).
Hawking Index
Invented by mathematician Jordan Ellenberg, the Hawking Index (HI) is the percentage of a book's readers who will finish it. Books with a lower HI are less likely to be completed. It is named after Stephen Hawking, whose book A Brief History of Time only scored 6.6% on the scale.
Jiffy
The earliest technical usage for jiffy was defined by Gilbert Newton Lewis (1875–1946). He proposed in 1926 a unit of time called the "jiffy" which was equal to the time it takes light to travel one centimetre in vacuum: ~ 33.3564 picoseconds.
Micromort
Measures the probability of death. One micromort equates to a 1 in 1,000,000 chance.
Minutes per Big Mac
Minutes per Big Mac refers to how many minutes one has to work in a country or region at average wage to afford one McDonalds Big Mac in that country or region.
Moment
A measurement of time used in medieval Europe: 1/40 of an hour = 1.5 minutes
New York second
The New York second is defined in Terry Pratchett's novel Lords and Ladies as the period of time between the traffic lights turning green and the cab behind one honking. Similarly, "a New York minute" means an instant or a very short time, referencing the busyness of New York and impatience of its residents.
Poronkusema
A unit of distance used in Finland to measure how far reindeer can walk before having to urinate: ~ 7.5–9.6 km. See also: Untranslatable Finnish Words [RR5:84]
Sagan
This tribute to Carl Sagan and his catchphrase “billions and billions” references a large quantity, technically at least 4 (2+2) billion.
Scaramucci
A Scaramucci (or Mooch) is 11 (sometimes 10) days and is named after the length of White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci's tumultuous tenure under US President Donald Trump.
Smoot
Defined as the height in 1958 of Oliver R. Smoot (MIT class of 1962). The Harvard Bridge was measured to be 364.4 Smoots using Smoot as a ruler. At the time, he was 5 feet, 7 inches, or 170 cm, tall. Google Earth includes the smoot as a unit of measurement.
Muggeseggele
Humorous Alemannic German idiom for a nonspecific very small length or amount of something. It refers to a housefly's scrotum – which, as you might imagine, is pretty tiny.
Warhol
A Warhol is an informal unit of measurement for fame, defined as 15 minutes of fame, derived from Andy Warhol's famous quote: "In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes”, e.g. 1 kilowarhol would represent 15,000 minutes, or 10.42 days, of fame.
Story Idea: David Astle
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References
wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_humorous_units_of_measurement
scienceabc.com/eyeopeners/what-are-some-weird-and-obscure-units-of-measurement
Images
1. Anthony Scaramucci at the White House in Washington on 21 July 2017. Photo credit: Pablo Martinez Monsivais
2. Honey bee using his bee's dick
3. Donkey power illustration. Credit: Laura Dozor
4. Horse's height measured in hands
5. A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking, 1988
6. Minutes per Big Mac around the world. Source: ConvergeEx Group
7. Poronkusema. Credit: ididnthavemyglasseson.com
8. Video: "Anthony Scaramucci’s 10 day tenure the White House, remembered", Washington Post, 2017
9. Oliver Smoot used to measure the Massachusetts Avenue bridge in 1958. Credit: MIT Museum
10. Andy Warhol. Credit: ADC Hall of Fame
