Why does BMI have units of kg/m^2 when we are three dimensional? Wouldn’t kg/m^3 or g/cm^3 be more accurate?
In: 100
Literally because the formula is mass (kg) / (height (m))^2.
The end calculation has the units from the input.
It sounds like you’re maybe asking why we care about kg/m^2 and not kg/m^3. That’s a decent question. BMI is a very rough guide so it doesn’t need to be perfect. It’s useful in that a result of less than 18 or over 25 probably means you should double check. There are perfectly legit reasons for those results, but there are also lots of unhealthy reasons.
BMI is a very rough tool to give an estimate on a complex topic. It doesn’t need to be perfect, it just needs to say if you should probably dig a bit deeper.
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