this post was submitted on 12 Mar 2024
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Science Memes

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temperature (mander.xyz)
submitted 8 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 48 points 8 months ago (3 children)

If fahrenheit was how people felt, then room temperature would be 0 because that's the ideal temperature. Negative fahrenheit would be too cold, positive to warm.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I would like to use this system you propose. 0 is room temperature, plus/minus 100 is death by freezing or heatstroke... But we probably have to do some work to make units fit in a linear way. Are you filing the patent or am I?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

I was in a sauna at +95 Celsius for several minutes the other day. And within the same week I felt -35 Celsius cold on my bare skin.

Both could kill me provided a bit more exposure, but they don't instantly. Meanwhile, +4 Celsius can also cause death by hypothermia pretty easily in the right circumstances.

So, while I like the idea, I think implementation will be hard as there is no clear death number on either end of the spectrum. Not to mention humidity, clothing, exertion, level of hydration, etc...

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

That isn't consistent with K and C though. -K doesn't exist. And water doesn't become more frozen at -C (well I guess it technically becomes different kinds of frozen).

Zero in that sense represents the absolute limit that one could exist in a particular state, which for F would be comfort? I guess the issue with humans is that 0 would be very subjective. But I think for almost all humans, the limit would be closer to 40F than 0F.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

-K doesn't exist.

It does though, but negative Kelvin is actually hotter than any positive Kelvin.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

100 is hot out and 0 is cold. That's not crazy. 35 being hot out is pretty arbitrary for day to day use. But if your job is boiling water every day, it's probably not the best.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago

The freezing point of water seems a hell of a lot more relevant to what humans consider 'cold'...which is why it's the zero. The boiling point of water isn't the zero in Celsius after all.

Also 'cold' as a concept is often represented with symbols related to frozen water such as snow flakes and icicles.