: Re: When to not using SI symbols for units? In the book What If?, the author usually write the unit as kilometer, atmosphere, megawatt instead of km, atm, MW. However he does use the symbols in

@Pierce369

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The most important thing (at least, in almost all circumstances) is consistency. Most of the time, as long as you're consistent, you'll be forgiven for whatever choice you make.

If you're writing in a particular context, and other people writing in that context write the units in a certain way, do that. If you know of some specific reason why a certain choice is wiser or more appropriate than another, do that. Otherwise, just take your pick and be consistent.

"What if?" is essentially a comedy book (or at least, due to its association with a well known humorous web-comic, comes with some expectation of comedic content), so it's very possible the writer is being deliberately inconsistent for comedic effect.

Also possible is that the writer and editor both simply missed it. It happens.

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