[Avodah] The Real Shiurim -- They're Smaller Than You Think

[Micha Berger]

On Mon, May 14, 2018 at 03:28:24PM -0400, Saul Guberman via Avodah wrote:
: I would say there would be a change.  It seems to me that everyone wants to
: be empirically correct on this calculation. The big problems are trying to
: area measurement(etzbah), or weight measurements (diram)  to equal volume
: measurements (kzayis).  It would seem that none were precise, unless they
: were using a particular persons' thumb and forearm.

>From what I posted in the past from the AhS (OC 373:34), is seems
the definitions themselves were not constants. A person is supposed
to be using their own thumb, fist or forearm when the din is only
about them. And standardized numbers are only invoked for things like
eiruv where one has to serve many people and "ameru chakhamim denimdod
lechumerah" -- use an ammah that covers a very high percentile of the
people relying on it.

And I tried to discuss what this would mean for shiurim like kezayis,
where a person isn't using his own body or something he could only own
one of, as a measure. But the discussion went in its own direction.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             I have great faith in optimism as a philosophy,
micha at aishdas.org        if only because it offers us the opportunity of
http://www.aishdas.org   self-fulfilling prophecy.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                              - Arthur C. Clarke