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Comment by eps | Hacker News Reader

If it could deduce density from the material name, it'd useful for volume-to-mass conversions., e.g.

   1 cup of butter -> g

Not sure if it's quite scientific though... :)

Wolfram Alpha can do this:

  (density of gold) * (average volume of human)

  -> 1282 kg

And if you do:

  (density of gold) * (average volume of human) * (price of gold)

It will even show you a plot of the time series of its value since the early 20th century.

GNU Units is extensible in this regard. You can add your own dimensions.

I'm trying to think of how you'd specify density of butter, perhaps "butterdensity", cognate, "earthmass".

I've got a number of geographic areas specified, so I can give you, say, paper size in milli manhattanarea.