absolute system electromagnetics Metric The evolution of telecommunications and other applications of electricity in the 19th century led to a plethora of units for associated measurement. Concomitant realization that the electrical and magnetic effects could be represented in mechanical terms led to the expression of electromotive force and current, and thereby resistance, in terms of the metre, gram, and second. Such expression of the electrical in terms purely of the established mechanical units was called ‘absolute’.

Gauss is seen as pioneering this absolutism, within the context of his millimetre–milligram–second system, Nature 62, 414 (1900) but it ...