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Fun fact time, -40F is -40C.
And 575F is 575K
Fahrenheit is a strange scale.
It’s just designed with a slightly different set of assumptions.
Instead of water freezing and boiling 100° apart, it’s 180° in fahrenheit. That makes it so that they’re on the opposite sides of a temperature gauge, and a degree of rotation of the gauge matches a degree of temperature.
Instead of zero being the freezing point of water under specific conditions, it’s a brine solution whose temperature will stabilize in a way that’s useful for using as a calibration point.Stripped of its context, it’s odd. But it’s not irrational, just no longer consensus as the standard, and as such deprecated.
Fahrenheit makes sense for humans. Most of your day to day climates are in the 0 to 100 scale, and every 10 degrees is a noticeable level change.
- 100 super hot day, approaching unsafe without counter measures
- 90 really hot day, slightly annoying and should take precautions
- 80, hot day, more annoying than anything
- 70, beautiful day, enjoy it
- 60 not to bad, if it’s windy you could be slightly on the cold side
- 50 long sleeves or maybe a hoodie
- 40 definitely a jacket, and hat
- 30 full on coat, scarfe, and hat
- 20 multiple layers of out for a while, maybe double pants
- 10 annoyingly cold, need to start thinking about the safety precautions
- 0 and below, temperature now measured in hold long you can be outside before danger
Celsius makes sense for science stuff because it’s derived from science stuff, so things like calories and energy work with it. But it doesn’t really apply to everyday life as well. So it actually makes sense to use both units for the things the are good at.
It depends on what you were raised with. For me I have all these relevant points in my head for C. 25 is nice, under 20 you slowly need to dress longer stuff. Over 30 is hot, over 40 sucks hard, over 50 can become deadly soon. Body temp is around 37.
I don’t science anymore, but living in a F country, I keep in mind for conversions:
0C is freezing point of water ~32F 20-22C is room temp ~68-72F 30C+ is Unhappy temperatures/hot.
Really only things I need to remember, and gradient based off of. It can get up to 45C where I live, but that would never be important to me. I hate the heat, if it’s 30C+, the degree to which it is hot matters little, I’m going to just want to stay out of the sun or go inside.
A F country? You can just say the US, I doubt it’d be Cayman Islands or Liberia lol.
Being from outside of the US I’m used to Celsius for everything, so I can make the same list, the numbers are just not whole 10s and I would probably round to nearest 5.
They probably don’t understand numbers not ending in 0.
Just an fyi, 100F is not “unsafe without counter measures” level of hot. That would be around 115+F. I say this as someone from a city that regularly hits 120F during the summer. 100 you can still get in your car, 115+ you need to wear gloves or else you’ll get 3rd degree burns. 100 have to buy pizza for lunch, 115+ just bake a pizza in your car.
I work outside in the Texas sun. 100F is unsurvivable without regular water intake and regular breaks. That would literally define it as unsafe without counter measures. You’re talking about walking to your car. We’re talking about actually being in it. Like playing a sport or fishing. 110 here means you can only work in short 15-20 minute bursts. 100 and you’re sweating so profusely your entire shirt Is soaked. At 90 it’s warm and a little toasty. At 80 it feels pretty good out. At 70 is literally the perfect temperature. 60 starts to get a bit on the chill side. 50 is light jacket weather. 40 is heavier jacket weather. 30 is a winter coat and multiple layers. Works just fine for us. If you don’t like it then don’t use it. I don’t even know why this argument is so prevalent. It’s not complicated like y’all would like everyone to believe.
100F is unsurvivable without regular water intake and regular breaks.
That’s cute. You do know there are other places in the world rather than your tiny little bubble, right? 38ºC (100ºF for those stuck in the past) is a regular hot summer day in most of Brazil.
Humans adapt to temperature, if you took someone who lives in greenland and put them in the Sahara desert they’d probably die faster than someone from around there
Yeah, I was using getting into your car as an example because our burn center has to put out a warning every year due to people literally burning their hand off getting into their car. Like I said, my state regularly gets to 120 in the summer. Texas rarely gets that hot. I’ve already stated in my previous comment that you’d need to drink more water, but it’s not going to fucking kill you. Hell, during summer we are lucky if it gets below 105 at night. You’re being really dramatic with the whole “my shirt is soaked in sweat!!” When you obviously live in a humid area. It being 70 in Florida will get you the same results. Like seriously, 100 ain’t shit, yeah drink more water, but you don’t need to stop every 2 minutes for a water break. 110 here means construction crews stop working at 2 instead of 6, and no there are no 10-15 increments of working. You shouldn’t only be drinking water, which will make you sick, anyways. You should also have an intake of oral salts to balance everything out. And it will prolong your need for water. And for the record, I was homeless for years so I have literally lived in the heat and seen countless people die from exposure. No one ever died when it was 100 out.
But it doesn’t really apply to everyday life as well. So it actually makes sense to use both units for the things the are good at.
It’s funny to assume that all people using Celsius are unable to ascertain how they will feel outside based on the temperature value.
I mean, I understand that round numbers are cute, but we are able to handle numbers ending in 5 as well as numbers ending in 0.
Somebody’s from the north. Even as warm blooded as I am 80 is a nice day and 90 is just annoyingly hot.
why are you being so heavily downvoted? you’re not even saying anything controversial.
Because it assumes that using Celsius makes the same estimations impossible. It’s basically telling most of the world that we outside the US are stupid.
Curious, how easy is it for you to understand what X°F is?
I don’t have the need to know it. But the comfort of rubes is not a reason to persist in a backward unit.
But again, the US is such a backward and sick country in so many other ways, that is even better they keep acting backwards. It’s a reminder to the rest of the world to keep our distance.
That’s not particularly nice. I said nothing ill against you, and I feel it’d be implied by my question that I am one of the “rubes” you’re speaking of. Such an unwarranted jab.
And wishing for the suffering of 300,000,000 people is cruel.
And at what temperatures are C and K equal?
Never. They use the same spacing between degrees. The Kelvin scale was derived from the Celsius scale, just placing the 0° at absolute zero rather than at the freezing point of water.
Based on human perception, based on water chemistry, based on physics.
You’ll be shocked to learn that the distance in Kelvin is also adjusted to water “chemistry”, albeit changing the aggregate state seems more physics to me, since no molceules are reacting with each other.
Thankfully that has been redefined using the Boltzmann constant, so now anyone in the universe can agree on °C and K without needing to measure any Vienna standard ocean water.
I was going to make a joke about how Austria is landlocked, how did we come up with the idea of making an ocean water standard.
Apparently the IAEA which is headquartered here set that standard, for anyone else curious.
You can’t change the aggregate state of a single molecule, or how do you mean that? Excluding plasma.
you can of a lot of molecules though. and tgat is classically “physics” rather than “chemistry”. Classical chemistry is reactiona between atoms or molecules to form new ones.
If you get deeper into it, the lines between chemistry and physics blur anyways.
Ah yes, now I understand your previous comment. My reading error, thanks.
Nah Kelvin is just on hydrogen perspective
(Kelvin and Celsius are the same scale just with different 0)
So, Kelvin in Physics, Celsius in daily usage and Fahrenheit…?
Zero Fahrenheit is the freezing point of brine (of a certain concentration). That’s water chemistry.
Originally, 90F was based on the average human body temperature, but that later changed to 96F, which just goes to show how arbitrary that scale is.
It’s all arbitrary. Someone just decided to base a scale off of something and that something isn’t fixed from the start. The meter used to be based off the measurement of the earth, but now it’s based off of light.
It’s just some random semi-useful starting point that we all agree on so we’re using the same language.
The meter did not change, science has merely defined it more precisely and reliably over time. It is a measure of length, still one 40 millionth of the circumference of the earth through the poles. Other definitions like the speed of light definition will give you the same result. These newer definitions have reduced uncertainty and added ways to reproduce its length by natural means. But it’s not like the ‘original’ meter was shorter or longer than today’s meter, at least not by any noticeable margin.
Shifting the top end of a temperature scale by over five percent of the scale is a bit more arbitrary than that.
Fahrenheit: how hot humans feel
Celsius: how hot water feels
Kelvin & Rankine: how hot atoms feel
I don’t think how hot humans feel works at all, it’s just arbitrary
Can humans survive 100 degree heat? Yes so it doesn’t represent 100%
150 for 3rd degree burns (almost instant), does Fahrenheit go off base 150? Also no
What about cold? Well -40 requires a lot of layers, so then +40 should be pretty hot for humans right? Nope, because it’s not related to humans at all
I don’t think how hot humans feel works at all, it’s just arbitrary
Fahrenheit was originally calculated to be 64 even divisions between water freezing temp and human body temp, then 32 more units below freezing.
Then ambient human body temp was recalculated from 96F to 98.6F.
So it’s not exactly arbitrary. It’s based on powers of 2, based upon an inaccurate measurement.
I mean, the temperature 0 was assigned because it was the lowest temperature that winter in Fahrenheit’s town, and the “powers of two” was only chosen because it was simple to mark degree lines on his instrument. Feels quite arbitrary to me…
And yet, as a person, Fahrenheit seems far more intuitive and Celsius arbitrary.
100°F was supposed to be average human body temp. Guy who made the scale fucked up his math and we ended up actually at 98.6°F
Can humans survive 100 degree heat? Yes so it doesn’t represent 100%
I have no idea what this means.
150 for 3rd degree burns (almost instant), does Fahrenheit go off base 150? Also no
What about cold? Well -40 requires a lot of layers, so then +40 should be pretty hot for humans right? Nope, because it’s not related to humans at all
Why do these matter? What percentage of humans live where it’s regularly -40 degrees? Why does the scale need to be perfect in your opinion? And how is Celsius better?
I have no idea what this means.
Humans can survive 100 F so it’s not a scale of 0-100, which you would expect for a system based on humans
Why does the scale need to be perfect in your opinion?
The person I responded to said it was based off humans, I was arguing that it wasn’t because no patterns exist in relation to humans
And how is Celsius better?
Well the person claimed it’s based on the temperature of water at sea level with 0 being freezing and 100 being boiling. This would be the 0-100% for water
Technically, water can still go higher than 100°C, same as humans can go higher than 100°F. Water turns into steam. If the temperature continues to rise, the steam would theoretically enter a plasma state. Then, you could say the water has “died” as the atoms and molecules lose their electrons.
Humans can survive 100 F so it’s not a scale of 0-100, which you would expect for a system based on humans
No one said it’s a scale limited from 0 to 100 on the basis of survivability. That’s something you just made up on the spot to push some weird narrative.
The person I responded to said it was based off humans, I was arguing that it wasn’t because no patterns exist in relation to humans
I again have no idea what you’re saying. The patterns of 0 being low and 100 being high isn’t a pattern related to humans? That’s obviously not true. We use 0 as the bottom and 100 for the top on a lot of other things.
Well the person claimed it’s based on the temperature of water at sea level with 0 being freezing and 100 being boiling. This would be the 0-100% for water
Why are you limiting 0 and 100 as cut offs?
If farenheit represents how humans feel then 50 is the most comfortable temperature right?
0 should be the most comfortable, with less being cold and more being hot.
This is a great scale. Let’s solve all the arguments about temperature and instead just create a “pleasantness scale”. Could probably even market this and sell a “personalised pleasantness scale” and you pass it out to your friends when you meet them.
No one said it represents “100%”, whatever that is even supposed to mean. 100F is really hot outside. 0 F is really cold. Doesn’t have to make 100% sense. Celsius doesn’t make perfect sense either. There is no perfect magical scale that works completely.
Fahrenheit only works like that if ur used to extreme cold tempature. Anything under 10c (50f) is cold af to me and 38c (100f) is hot sure but nowhere near as cold as -17c (0f) is
It’s pointing out multiple ways that it doesn’t represent people
“really hot” and “really cold” are supremely useless terms in this context though.
Yeah, this gets repeated (by Americans) every time a discussion about temperature measuring systems comes up, but it is complete nonsense. The vast majority of Earth’s population are completely fine with measuring how hot they feel in celsius, it is only people who are unaccustomed to that system who thinks it is somehow unqualified to do that.
American who lives in a country that uses C now.
20=frickin cold 30=swampy ass 40=nope
Not enough degrees of separation
20 isn’t cold at all, it’s perfectly warm.
10 is nippy, but you still warm up quick after a few minutes walking, and get sweaty if you’re working on something.
0 is cold enough for a couple layers. Jumper + jacket so you can take one off if you warm up too much.
-10 doesn’t feel that much different to 0.
-20 is time to put on a thicker coat over the jumper.
I’d like to propose a discussion between a person from Arizona and a person from Alaska to define what is “Really hot outside”
Im from Texas, and 100F is “stay inside in the AC” weather. I bet an Arizonan would say the same.
Being from a particularly hot or cold location doesn’t make you immune to heat or cold, it makes you a connoisseur of heat and cold. You get better at recognizing gradations of extreme temperature (knowing which are uncomfortable and which can literally kill you if you’re not careful), you learn how to plan ahead and dress for the weather, and you develop emotional coping systems for extremes.
But if it’s either 100°F or 0°F, no matter where you’re from, that’s a temperature to be wary of.
Heyo! I’m from Arizona. 100 is not “stay inside the AC” weather for us, it’s practically “time to get a light jacket” weather.
Or cold
Since when is 0°C “fairly cold” it’s literally freezing.
0°C is completely fine with jeans and a thick jacket, especially when it’s sunny and there isn’t much wind. It’s cold, but there’s probably not much ice or snow, if anything, probably mostly slush.
Compared to say -20 C where you should have a good ski jacket and ski pants, warm shoes and socks, generally multiple layers everywhere, winter gloves and so on.
It can be -20 C and you can be still fine with jeans and a jacket if it isn’t windy.
What I’m saying is temperature alone doesn’t tell you the whole story.
Yeah, part of why they also have “comfort” or “feels like” in forecasts besides the actual termperature.
But so is 100°F completely fine with a shirt and shorts and some shade.
So basically: |0°F| > |100°F|, where | is the mathematical absolute operator.
0°F is really cold, while 100°F is merely somewhat hot.
Humidity. I’m guessing you don’t live in a humid place because freezing temps are horrifically cold here. You will need a winter coat and multiple layers of your going to be outside for a while. I layer long Johns under my pants and wear my parka and a light jacket as well as 2 layers of socks. Everytime a northerner comes here they are shocked at the cold/heat. That’s because the air here is full of water to the point that you will actually get wet just from the humidity, not even sweating.
It is also literally melting.
I’ve been in -37C snow shoveling. Since then 0C doesn’t even register as cold to me
Yep, and I’ve been in 110C in sauna. It’s pretty fucking hot but not death
I think more that if it’s 100c outside the planet is basically dead.
I’m pretty sure you mean 110°F, don’t you?
110°C = 230°F
110°F = 43°CNo. Finnish sauna is usually around 80°C to 90°C, but sometimes crazy people do over 100°C. The starting temp in sauna competitions was 110°C
I just read that wikipedia article, and man, those saunas are crazy. I guess they really did mean °C.
You go to 43C sauna?? Lmao
Lol that’s F
110°F is a very cold sauna.
Have you ever been to a sauna…?
If a sauna is 110F I’m leaving because that thing is broken
Yeah I read spa for some reason and was thinking water temperature.
The temperature that water freezes at is only fairly cold weather by a lot of people’s perception.
I’d call it “chilly”. No jacket for running to the mailbox, or if I’ll be outside for half an hour or so. Light jacket otherwise. I don’t expect it to snow, since it’s not actually cold enough usually, and there won’t be ice on the ground unless it’s just warmed up.So it might be “freezing”, but that doesn’t make it cold.
It’s almost like being ‘fairly cold for humans’ is a wide range, and subjective, therefore useless as a baseline.
Well I’d say that’s why op chose the adverb “fairly”, it gets across that it’s a wide range and lacks specificity.
Not completely useless as a baseline, but fairly general.
Obviously the freezing point of water is also a range (depending on purity, altitude, etc) but would you say it’s less, or more specific?
Compared with the human experience of “cold”? More specific, even when talking about ocean water and water on mountains or whatever altitude water you’re talking about.
True, but that’s also not super relevant to the merits of a temperature scale. Fahrenheit isn’t actually based off of human subjective temperature perception, it just coincidentally lines up a bit closer with the comfortable range for people in northern temperate climates.
Before it’s redefinition in terms of Celsius, fahrenheit was defined by a particular temperature stable brine solution (easy to replicate for calibration), and with the freezing and boiling points of water set to be 180 degrees apart, because of the relationship with a circle.
People decided we liked base10 adherence more than trigonometry, and then everyone adopted Celsius, so we should use Celsius. Doesn’t make fahrenheit some sort of random scale, just deprecated.
The most common defence of Fahrenheit are Americans saying it is the most suited for humans because 0 is “very cold” and 100 “very hot”. That is why people are referencing it with regards to the merits of a temperature scale in this thread.
In Aus we say it’s fucking freezing
Everything about -10 is warm.
I would put it at a 3/10
We’re not made out of water.
0°C getting cold outside
100°C getting hot in saunaNever any love for Rankine.
Thank you, came to be a scold myself if you weren’t here for it
I like that
100c and 100K = dead but for different reasons
100° outside is dead
True, you can be in 100’C indoors and be fine (sauna). Though I’ve heard some people think you’ll boil alive there lol
