Comment Comment by IvyMike > The kilometer was based on 1/10000 the distance between the poles and the equator.The definition we should have used (and almost did) was that the meter was the length of a pendulum with 1 second swing (in other words, a pendulum with a 2 second period). https://maa.org/sites/default/files/images/upload_library/22...If we had done that, the gravitational constant of Earth would be exactly pi^2 m/s^2: Neat, right? https://godplaysdice.blogspot.com/2007/09/why-g-2.html parent IvyMike 3 years ago
The definition we should have used (and almost did) was that the meter was the length of a pendulum with 1 second swing (in other words, a pendulum with a 2 second period). https://maa.org/sites/default/files/images/upload_library/22...
If we had done that, the gravitational constant of Earth would be exactly pi^2 m/s^2: Neat, right? https://godplaysdice.blogspot.com/2007/09/why-g-2.html