International SI system - a unified system of measurements in a new world

For a long time, different measurement systems existed in different states (and even in different regions of one country!). While people lived relatively apart from each other, there was no particular problem in this. However, in connection with the processes of globalization and the development of the international division of labor, the creation of a unified system of measures and weights has become inevitable.

This process took quite a long time, and its result became a kind of compromise between the world's largest scientific schools, each of which had to make certain concessions. In the end, the final trait was summed up in 1960, when the existing SI system was adopted.

The very abbreviation comes from the French word combination Système International and is understandable not only to any scientist, but also to an ordinary citizen who has completed the course of secondary school. In its essence, SI system represents a set of the most important units of measurement, as well as their alphabetic and graphic images. Its adoption does not at all mean that all states that have signed the relevant charter are obliged to abandon their own systems. However, when it comes to works exhibited at the international community's court, or on technology that is sold around the world, here the SI system acts as the main institution of measures and weights.

Since 1970, the famous SI brochure has been published, which gives the most detailed description to all basic units of measurement, and also reports on recent changes. To date, this document has been reprinted eight times, and in 1985, along with the French appeared and the English edition. However, in all developed countries, this brochure also appears in the local language.

The SI system considers as the main seven physical quantities. This meter, kilogram, ampere, kelvin, second, candela and mole. It is believed that none of these indicators can not be obtained from others, that is, each of these units has a so-called independent dimension. On their basis, by means of multiplication and division, derived units of measurement, as well as prefixes, are output. The characteristics of these elements are constantly refined, and often serious scientific research leads to the emergence of the need for new values.

The SI system experienced certain difficulties in physics in connection with the differences in pronunciation and graphic representation of this or that unit, it is not a secret that, for example, there are big differences between the French and Chinese spelling of the term "kilogram". In connection with this, in the charter of 1960 it was specially emphasized that the designations of units are not abbreviations, but algebraic objects that do not depend on language. The only difficulty arose with Russia and other countries, where a Cyrillic letter is used, not a Latin one. The way out of this situation was the actual permission on the part of the international community for the use of understandable notations in these states.

At present, the SI system, on the one hand, is a certain guarantor of the inviolability of the basic scientific concepts, and on the other, is constantly ready for new changes and revolutions.