It is really a numeral on the noisy alarms that tells me when I should get up. For instance today, a perfectly ordinary Thursday. The week has already been well advanced and I am correspondingly tired. But none of this is of any help, and because each morning this tiny little numeral resides within me, I enjoy getting up in those days.
Well then, legs on the edge of the bed and I drag myself in to the bathroom. Once again, I am met by way of a numeral. While I can easily adjust as soon as I’m awoken by my alarm clock, the numeral on my accursed scales will not seem easy to influence. Or, at best, in the long-term. I decide at night to go jogging, but first splash my face with water. Even then, I see a numeral with my inner eye ? the water meter is also running.
Refreshed and dry once again, I immediately encounter another numeral. The thermometer tells me that I will wear a jacket today as soon as I leave the house. And although it really is only a short distance to the automobile, I am glad within my own private measuring station for that little bit of advice. Once I reach the car, I’m met by another numeral. My arrival at work is going to be delayed by a short while because I have to fill the fuel tank on the way. As soon as I reach the filling station, I’m in a position to check another numeral, one that indicates my tyre pressures. A thing that I really do not check often enough. Also, while my fuel tank is slowly getting filled, I ask myself if anyone has had the trouble to check the fuel pump utilizing a standardized 5-litre canister. You will want to? You see, it is quite normal for an official from the calibration authority to check the accuracy of everything regularly. In Indulgence , we can depend upon the fact that everything is getting measured accurately.
My extended solution to work takes me past a large building site. What beautiful machines! Especially with the cranes ? once again with that inner eye of mine ? I can see so many numerals: The weight raised on the boom will undoubtedly be monitored, and angles are receiving measured. When approaching the limits of the tipping lines, even the thrust and support forces become of interest. If I had the time, I’d stand at the boundary like a small boy and stare at all of it.
Then, finally, I reach the business and a perfectly normal Thursday follows its usual course. As always, numerals are in work here, ones that ultimately co-determine our lives. No matter what we do, and where we may go, measurements are omnipresent. Once you start thinking about it, the list just keeps getting longer: I start to see the world in numerals because we at WIKA divide up the everyday things into numerals. We can build scales with load cells, and we are able to establish the temperature with measuring sensors. We can measure pressure in three different ways. We are able to measure flow rates and levels. We are able to measure tension and compression forces and we can calculate angles. We can make entire systems safe by monitoring measured values. Anyone who knows metrology sees the planet through different eyes. Does that apply to you, too?
Note
More info on our measuring instruments are available on the WIKA website.