The Measure of All Things: The Seven-Year Odyssey and Hidden Error That Transformed the World.

While the United States still shuns the metric system, the rest of the world has embraced it for nearly 2 centuries. Alder's compelling story of the rise of the metric system begins during the French Revolution, when measurement systems differed from country to country and in some cases town to town. Scientists dreamed that universal measurement standards would enable better global communication and trade. It was determined that one meter would equal one-ten-millionth of the distance from the North Pole to the equator. But how far was that? Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Delambre and Pierre-Francois-Andre Mechain were tasked to figure it out and did so by measuring the meridian arc that runs from Dunkirk through Paris to Barcelona. Alder paints an enchanting portrait of Delambre and Mechain's quest, which took 7 years to complete. Repeating the journey himself by bicycle, Alder traces the two men's paths and describes an error that the pair introduced that persists in the metric system today. Drawing on correspondence and extensive research, Alder's examination of the quest to determine the meter and how this error affected Delambre and Mechain makes for a marvelous tale. Free Pr, 2002, 422 p., hardcover, $27.00.