In German, it’s all "Tonne" ;)

In the US we don't really use the word tonne. We might say metric ton though. Use that a bunch in the same context and it just gets shortened to ton.

Admittedly megagram is a better word, as it's not overloaded.

> In the US we don't really use the word tonne.

Yes, that was pretty much the crux of my point. If you did use that spelling, you wouldn't have to disambiguate, and it'd align with popular English-speaking nations that already use metric.

It's a bit like not using the word 'metre' - despite the USA recalcitrantly eschewing the actual measurement - and confusingly re-purposing 'meter' (a device for measuring something).

I mean, sure, they sound the same (refer sibling comment and response) but context can inform in spoken English.

In written English it's dreadfully convenient to have unique strings for unique concepts (or words).

I think you only got down voted here because some fraction of people who identify as US citizens reflexively disagree with anything slightly indicating there are other correct definitions other than their own.

Consider the down votes US Customary Up-Votes.

This is just the -re vs -er difference in English spelling between British English and American English, dating back to Webster's reforms in the late 1700s. https://www.learnenglish.de/spelling/spellingrevser.html

Frankly, the -er is better based on actual English pronunciation rules. The -re ending comes from French and is less compatible with how most of the rest of English is pronounced.

And I can't say I've ever been confused by these two different meanings of the word. Can you even come up with an example sentence illustrating ambiguity here?

Ooh, that first bit suggests you're in danger of suggesting there's a coherent, sensible, set of rules for English ... which I'm sure you don't really subscribe to. Anyone adopting that position as a starting point is going to have a bad day, of course. : )

So, is 'er' better in terms of pronunciation? Perhaps, though I don't think that matters much, as pronunciation varies so wildly based on country, region, education, etc, plus there's so much inconsistency with spelling -> pronunciation within English that I think it's fair to say that ship has long since sailed.

In terms of writing however there's a huge advantage to having words with different meanings have different spellings. I assume I don't have to pitch that idea terribly hard?

For us non-Americans I suspect the frustration boils down to having a recalcitrant nation stubbornly refusing to join the rest of the metric world while simultaneously poisoning the language well of metric unit names everyone else is already using.

'metre' is homonoymic and homographic even in British English.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metre_(poetry)

If there's anyone responsible for English words having way too many meanings, it ain't Americans.

I perhaps wasn't 100% clear.

I'm not suggesting English is a perfect representation of thoughts & concepts into strings of letters & punctuation, or that any one variant has tweaked it to be just right.

I'm complaining that the Rest Of The World has to contend with the dilution of metric terminology (by the regrettable rise of f.e. 'metric ton') that's being perpetrated by a nation state that doesn't even use metric.

The US uses a lot of metric, just not exclusively. Which is why we'd say 'metric ton' anyway. Otherwise we'd just say 'ton'.

I feel we are back to where we came in.

And how is tonne pronounced?

Somewhere between 'ton' and 'tone'.

Though I think American English tends to pronounce 'ton' as 'tun', would that be right, or are there significant regional accent variations?

Anyway, refer sibling comments on common usage and cultural defaults - and I'll re-emphasize that it works really well for written communication. Like this.

G'day - just to add for British English, here it's pronounced 'ton' (same as a ton) rhyming with 'stun' or TUN if you will.

It's extremely rare (don't think I've ever heard it) - except maybe in some industries still, I don't know - but there's an interesting history of advocacy/use of saying 'ton-E' or 'tunnie', to disambiguate the same way AmE pronounces it 'metric ton'.

Aha, but are you from the south?

I've never heard it pronounced as a two-syllable word in the UK, but I confess to only very occasionally travelling north of Luton.

SW, couldn't get much nearer the coast, yep.

I don't think it was ever common parlance, just important to disambiguate in some industries. Similarly I think 'thou' (-sandth of an inch) is preferred over 'mil' since that's such a common abbreviation of 'millimetre' (which =39thou, so you want to get that right).

There was an article posted here a few months back on the subject of 'thousands of an inch', the misuse of 'mill', etc - and a slight digression around how our friends on the far side of the pond are fascinated by fractions.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34891145

Like taunt, but without the trailing t.

taun

That seems like an UK-specific idea, and only works in writing. I doubt you'd find too many international English speakers make any distinction whatsoever between ton and tonne.

Well, I'm in Australia, and it's common here (too).

I suspect you'd find it's common in most English-speaking non-USA metric-embracing nation states.

It works fine spoken, too, because we could say 'imperial ton' or 'american ton' if we ever needed to refer to a specific, archaic, mostly abandoned unit of weight - which is, rounded down, effectively never.

FWIW we're taught to pronounce the word somewhere between 'ton' and 'tone', but, really, the context here is that all tonnes (or phonetic equivalent) are metric once you're outside the USA.

Re-purposing words - even 'only works in writing' (like we're using to communicate here) words - seems whatever the opposite of 'luxuriating in the massive potential breadth of language' might be called.

Specifically 'metric ton' I expect would be mildly offensive to everyone that uses metric, and doesn't want to disambiguate the pre-existing, and clearly more widely prevailing homophone of 'tonne'.

* * *

Canada does this too. I suspect the non-us anglo world does.

Commonwealth wide afaict, and that's essentially the vast majority of English speaking nations...