Why didn't the YDS remain decimal?

Can someone please explain to me why the "decimal system" characteristic of the Yosemite Decimal System was so needlessly abandoned by our forebears? I've always heard that class 5 refers to technical climbing and that the originators of the YDS didn't foresee difficulties advancing past 5.9, and once they did they added the 5.10 grade, but that doesn't make sense. The whole concept of a decimal system is that it's open-ended. Since the grading system is an artificial conceit, not a natural law, why not simply modify it such that class 5 refers to beginner/moderate climbing, class 6 is advanced, class 7 expert, class 8 extreme. I.e. instead of going to 5.10, 6.0 would be the logical next grade, and 5.10a = 6.0, 5.10b = 6.1.....5.14d = 7.9, etc. This would be more akin to the French style of grading. Why didn't the climbers of yore take this logical step? As usual, the U.S. insists on maintaining a mathematically incoherent system while the rest of the world shakes their collective heads (see the Imperial System). I hereby petition to make the YDS true to its moniker and revert it back to a proper decimal system. I'm sure some similarly enlightened MP'er with deeper pockets than me will step forward to cover the cost of reprinting the guidebooks. 

Logic and rock climbing don't belong in the same sentence, is your answer. Revel in the chaos! Smile when some nerd points out the rating system isn't decimal, the way I'm smiling at you.   

Because class 6 is aid climbing.

Class 6 already means something.

I’d be ok with it if they had skipped the letters and just had 5.11 ad the grade above 5.10 but what are you going to do?

I was happy with easy, moderate, and hard 5.10 in the late 60’s, early 70’s, and those adjectives could’ve been applied, with a bit of British style, to 5.11 also, and up, but Bridwell decided, probably while on acid, to break decimal ratings down into letter grades.

It stuck, it’s effective, takes less space in the guidebooks, and less time to utter.

Nick McNuttwrote:

Because class 6 is aid climbing.

And for a short period of time, grade 6 was also broken into decimals, 6.1 being a real easy aid route, up to 6.9 for the hardest. Obviously the idea never really caught on.  

Source - Roper's "Camp 4" book

As alluded to above, grading systems here, as elsewhere, have had long and complicated histories. In the 60s and 70s, several alternative grading systems were proposed--including some 'more logical', progressive ones, and a few were used in some guidebooks, but none 'caught-on', and the YDS, with all it's 'illogical beauty', became dominant--though both the +/- and a,b,c,d variations still exist in different locales (it seems that the +/- is more common in trad areas, a,b,c,d in sport, but this is not universal).

Kevin Worrallwrote:

It stuck, it’s effective, takes less space in the guidebooks, and less time to utter.

I would argue that the Ewbank system is the most logical - starts with 1, is open ended, rate difficulty increment is 1.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grade_(climbing) 

I am sort of pleasantly surprised that the American V scale is, actually, logical - V grades start with 1, is open ended, difficulty increment is 1. Thank you, Mr. Sherman

Aaron Kolb wrote:

Cause it's a dumb, illogical system to begin with. Smile and don't think too hard about it

Or just start using the French system and confuse all your American climbing partners

Aussie grades or bust.  29, mate.

Nate Awrote:

Class 6 already means something.

I’d be ok with it if they had skipped the letters and just had 5.11 ad the grade above 5.10 but what are you going to do?

So then Silence would be a...5.33?

Josh Rappoportwrote:

So then Silence would be a...5.33?

Exactly this. It would be much more intuitive and easier to grok that silence is 23 grades harder than any random .10

I understand that the Australian system is basically this way. Seems nice and simple. 

Well if you think 5.12b complex, you should try the British system

E, m, d, vd, hvd, ms, s, hd, mvs, vs, hvs, e1,..... Hxs. 

Now that's a right proper grading system 

The most logical system does not exist yet. While the Australian is the most intuitive we could do better. I have said this in other threads, mountain project theoretically could do this but it would be based on the relative ranking of climbs. The entire thing we care about is the perceived effort of a climb, you get 10,000 climbers to rank, the perceived difficulty of climbs they have completed. This ranking system would occur both within a crag and across crags it would work similar to a maxdiff. Then rather than grades you would have the relative difference between the climbs and then be able to assign a grade. This would correct correct sandbags, feather bags, be more objective and better account for differences in scale. I honestly couldn't tell you if the difference between 5.9- and 5.9 is the same or different than 5.10a and 5.10c.

The YDS remains because it works good enough, much like the imperial system. When I build stuff I would rather work in fractions (it is easier to cut something into 3/8ths than .375) than decimals and all the other benefits of the metric system would change my life in almost no way. Also, if you are rounding to the nearest whole number Fahrenheit is more precise (since it has twice as many units) than Celsius.  As far as I can tell, most metric places use imperial lumber sizes.

Princess Puppy Lovrwrote:

The YDS remains because it works good enough, much like the imperial system. When I build stuff I would rather work in fractions (it is easier to cut something into 3/8ths than .375) than decimals and all the other benefits of the metric system would change my life in almost no way. Also, if you are rounding to the nearest whole number Fahrenheit is more precise (since it has twice as many units) than Celsius.  

These comments are showing the true value of the American ( USA to be more precise) education system.

The YDS is the climbers version of a very tired musicians joke.  

The English Horn is neither English, nor a Horn; the YDS is neither from Yosemite, nor is it a Decimal System.

The mysteries of the world never cease.  

Josh Rappoportwrote:

So then Silence would be a...5.33?

Now that makes total sense since Silence is undoubtedly  harder than 5.3 but obviously easier than 5.4

amariuswrote:

These comments are showing the true value of the American ( USA to be more precise) education system.

How would the metric system improve the life of the average american? How does a simpleton like me cut wood that is already measured and will continue to be measured in inches (as far as I can tell lumber is in imperial units in metric countries) to the .1875 on a tape measure or .333?  I am not anti metric but the benefit of changing is pretty low and professions that metric units already benefit are already using them. 

I just wish we could use Roman numerals instead of Arabic ones. Except for that pesky lack of a zero or a decimal point. 

One of my first partners had a system,  it's easy,  I'll lead it. It's hard,  you lead it.  It's really hard, lets top rope it.  It's too hard,  let's go home. 

june mwrote:

One of my first partners had a system,  it's easy,  I'll lead it. It's hard,  you lead it.  It's really hard, lets top rope it.  It's too hard,  let's go home. 

I'm in favor of a binary system; I can climb it or I can't climb it. 

Princess Puppy Lovrwrote:

How would the metric system improve the life of the average american? How does a simpleton like me cut wood that is already measured and will continue to be measured in inches (as far as I can tell lumber is in imperial units in metric countries) to the .1875 on a tape measure or .333?  I am not anti metric but the benefit of changing is pretty low and professions that metric units already benefit are already using them. 

The whole idea behind going metric is not to measure inches in decimals but to get rid of inches, feet and yards and use meters, (hence metric system)like they do in “metric countries”.You don’t try and convert an imperial tape measure into metric equivalents, you get a metric tape measure and it’s extremely easy. The benefit is to be using the same logical system that the rest of the world is using. I’m not anti imperial but as a US builder for the last 45 years I saw the advantages and converted easily when working overseas with metric dimensional lumber. There is conversion cost for manufacturers to retool but it would pay off in the long run except so many Americans would not want to learn.