Lazy and economically undesirable are two different things. While I strongly dislike imperial system of measurements, it's easy enough to steer away from it in scientific subjects. I would definitely like to see the US steer toward using the Metric system, but I think we have other, more pressing issues to concern ourselves with at the moment.
Actually, scientists use metric because it's easier to keep track of, not because imperial is an inferior system. Metric units were not always more strongly defined than imperial units - although, today we have the luxury of defining a second in terms of the behavior of an uncharged cesium-133 atom at absolute zero. If there were ten inches in a foot, and 100 feet in a mile, I'm sure metric would never have come about.