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What a strange article. Seems to be an important subject but there's barely any references, there is a claim the metre isn't a fundamental unit while the article Metre claims it is and it even uses words like "dimensionful"... what's going on here? 213.10.112.111 ( talk) 18:09, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
Yargh! This is WP:OR or a misnomer at best. The choice of base quantities (time, distance, mass, ...) is a matter of definition (is it current or charge that is the "fundamental quantity"?), and what units are used to measure these is again are a matter of definition. There is a degree of arbitrariness to the definition that belies the term "fundamental". Just because the Birge reference uses the word "fundamental" in the way that SI uses the word "base" does not mean we should go with the solitary author who made a choice that does not fit well with our usage of 60+ years later. At the very least, as the article is now written, it should be renamed " Base units" (though the current article with that name refers to SI units). Would any self-respecting physicist call a standard basis of a geometric space "fundamental vectors"? No. This is analogous. — Quondum 22:06, 10 April 2015 (UTC)
This article seems to be erroneous, lacks references, and is too short for such an important subject. Furthermore SI_base_unit article should be sufficient to describe units that are thought to be mutualy independant. Ref: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/units.html Merge or redirect "Fundamental units" to SI_base_unit please. Abaharaki 05:15, 08 June 2008 (UTC)
I have rewritten the article to develop the thoughts of the author to their logical conclusion. In this form it is NOT appropraite to merge it with the SI base unit article, as the SI base unit article is factual and the fundamental unit article is somewhat philosophical. Ehrenkater ( talk) 20:32, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Please feel free to change whatever words you consider are inappropriate, as long as the principles are retained. The article as it was was inappropriate, see eg Abaharaki's comments above. Ehrenkater ( talk) 20:58, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Isn't the "bit" also a fundamental unit, important for information theory, thermodynamics, etc... I don't see how it can be made out of the other units mentioned here. 193.190.253.144 ( talk) 10:04, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
I am unsure that the information on eliminating the SI fundamental units by fixing the universal constants as dimensionless numbers is correct.
Particularly, the segment, starting at, "In theory, a system of fundamental quantities (or sometimes fundamental dimensions) would be such that every other physical quantity (or dimension of physical quantity) can be generated from them. One could eliminate any two of the metre, kilogram and second by setting c and h to unity or to a fixed dimensionless number......" The segment continues to list the ways to eliminate units and finally references Plank's Units.
But, the way it is explained, will not c after assuming it equal to 1, still have a dimension, may be called "cunit"? So an object travelling at half the speed of light will have speed 0.5 cunit and not simply 0.5? There is no meaning of c becoming dimensionless in the this context.
In reference to Plank Units, although the constants are normalized to 1, there still are units like Plank Length or Plank Time and so on and a c normalized to 1 still has the unit LT^-1. The article seems to give the impression that there will not remain any units left and we will be able to describe the world in numbers.[not a bad idea if you ask me :)]
I am not a suitable person but should someone suitable not correct this information? Or is my understanding incomplete/over-interpreted and this is valid information?
Thanks. Poojac20 ( talk) 11:47, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
How can the number of fundamental quantities be established in connection to some other aspects independently from the type of systems of units? Can this number be linked to the number of fundamental macroscopic physical laws?-- 86.125.156.119 ( talk) 11:59, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
The modern term for this appears to be "base unit" (to distinguish it from "derived unit"). Technically, there is nothing fundamental about these units; their choice is purely a matter of convention, and the term "fundamental unit" is therefore a misnomer. The term does not even occur in the article International System of Units, for example, and it is apparently not used in the SI standard, since that refers to "base unit", and links to SI base unit. The same argument applies to any system of measurement. It seems reasonable, therefore, that "base unit" is the notable term, and that this article should be renamed to Base unit (measurement), or some similarly disambiguated title. — Quondum 00:49, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
The section on natural units has currently has four paragraphs. The two long ones in the middle have no references. Only occasionally does the article topic -- base units -- come up in these middle paragraphs. With no references I don't know how to repair them.
The article by Duff cited in this section does not use "base unit" but has an interesting review characterization of 3, 2, 4, 7 "constants" with many references. Duff, Michael J. "How fundamental are fundamental constants?." Contemporary Physics 56.1 (2015): 35-47. Johnjbarton ( talk) 17:35, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
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What a strange article. Seems to be an important subject but there's barely any references, there is a claim the metre isn't a fundamental unit while the article Metre claims it is and it even uses words like "dimensionful"... what's going on here? 213.10.112.111 ( talk) 18:09, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
Yargh! This is WP:OR or a misnomer at best. The choice of base quantities (time, distance, mass, ...) is a matter of definition (is it current or charge that is the "fundamental quantity"?), and what units are used to measure these is again are a matter of definition. There is a degree of arbitrariness to the definition that belies the term "fundamental". Just because the Birge reference uses the word "fundamental" in the way that SI uses the word "base" does not mean we should go with the solitary author who made a choice that does not fit well with our usage of 60+ years later. At the very least, as the article is now written, it should be renamed " Base units" (though the current article with that name refers to SI units). Would any self-respecting physicist call a standard basis of a geometric space "fundamental vectors"? No. This is analogous. — Quondum 22:06, 10 April 2015 (UTC)
This article seems to be erroneous, lacks references, and is too short for such an important subject. Furthermore SI_base_unit article should be sufficient to describe units that are thought to be mutualy independant. Ref: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/units.html Merge or redirect "Fundamental units" to SI_base_unit please. Abaharaki 05:15, 08 June 2008 (UTC)
I have rewritten the article to develop the thoughts of the author to their logical conclusion. In this form it is NOT appropraite to merge it with the SI base unit article, as the SI base unit article is factual and the fundamental unit article is somewhat philosophical. Ehrenkater ( talk) 20:32, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Please feel free to change whatever words you consider are inappropriate, as long as the principles are retained. The article as it was was inappropriate, see eg Abaharaki's comments above. Ehrenkater ( talk) 20:58, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Isn't the "bit" also a fundamental unit, important for information theory, thermodynamics, etc... I don't see how it can be made out of the other units mentioned here. 193.190.253.144 ( talk) 10:04, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
I am unsure that the information on eliminating the SI fundamental units by fixing the universal constants as dimensionless numbers is correct.
Particularly, the segment, starting at, "In theory, a system of fundamental quantities (or sometimes fundamental dimensions) would be such that every other physical quantity (or dimension of physical quantity) can be generated from them. One could eliminate any two of the metre, kilogram and second by setting c and h to unity or to a fixed dimensionless number......" The segment continues to list the ways to eliminate units and finally references Plank's Units.
But, the way it is explained, will not c after assuming it equal to 1, still have a dimension, may be called "cunit"? So an object travelling at half the speed of light will have speed 0.5 cunit and not simply 0.5? There is no meaning of c becoming dimensionless in the this context.
In reference to Plank Units, although the constants are normalized to 1, there still are units like Plank Length or Plank Time and so on and a c normalized to 1 still has the unit LT^-1. The article seems to give the impression that there will not remain any units left and we will be able to describe the world in numbers.[not a bad idea if you ask me :)]
I am not a suitable person but should someone suitable not correct this information? Or is my understanding incomplete/over-interpreted and this is valid information?
Thanks. Poojac20 ( talk) 11:47, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
How can the number of fundamental quantities be established in connection to some other aspects independently from the type of systems of units? Can this number be linked to the number of fundamental macroscopic physical laws?-- 86.125.156.119 ( talk) 11:59, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
The modern term for this appears to be "base unit" (to distinguish it from "derived unit"). Technically, there is nothing fundamental about these units; their choice is purely a matter of convention, and the term "fundamental unit" is therefore a misnomer. The term does not even occur in the article International System of Units, for example, and it is apparently not used in the SI standard, since that refers to "base unit", and links to SI base unit. The same argument applies to any system of measurement. It seems reasonable, therefore, that "base unit" is the notable term, and that this article should be renamed to Base unit (measurement), or some similarly disambiguated title. — Quondum 00:49, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
The section on natural units has currently has four paragraphs. The two long ones in the middle have no references. Only occasionally does the article topic -- base units -- come up in these middle paragraphs. With no references I don't know how to repair them.
The article by Duff cited in this section does not use "base unit" but has an interesting review characterization of 3, 2, 4, 7 "constants" with many references. Duff, Michael J. "How fundamental are fundamental constants?." Contemporary Physics 56.1 (2015): 35-47. Johnjbarton ( talk) 17:35, 28 December 2023 (UTC)