On March 30, 1791, the French Academy of Sciences defined the length of one meter. Before this date, there were two definitions of this measure of length: the first was based on the length of aSLINGERand the other was based on a fraction of the length of a halfmeridian, or line oflength. The French Academy chose the meridian definition. This defined a meter as one ten-millionth of the distance toEquatorUnpleasantThe North Pole.
The meter is the basic unit of distance in the International System of Units (SI), the world's standardized systemmeasurement. Since the 1960s, all countries have adopted or legally recognized SI. As a universal measurement standard, the meter helped replacehandeland scientificfacts.
However, the definition of a meter has changed since 1791. In 1983 the meter was given its current definition. The meter is defined as the length of the path that light takes in avacuumin a time interval of 1/299,792,458 second.
