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I'm always confused when people say Fahrenheit is great because it's "more granular" and makes it easier to decide what to wear. Do other people use clothing th

by hnbad 6y ago

I'm always confused when people say Fahrenheit is great because it's "more granular" and makes it easier to decide what to wear. Do other people use clothing this differently from me? How many increments worth of clothing variation do you have in your wardrobe? Based on all conversations I've had so far, it seems Americans just think their intuition being tied to Fahrenheit (because that's what they're familiar with) make Fahrenheit intrinsically more intuitive. I live in the North West of Germany, so based on the local climate this is how temperature works for me: 180°C/200°C (365°F/392°F): oven temperature; this is a good default for most frozen goods, e.g. store bought frozen pizza Roughly 100°C (212°F): boiling water; this is what comes out of your kettle Roughly 60°C (140°F): hot water; anything above this will probably scald you Above 30°C (86°F): warm summer; without wind chill it's probably going to be humid so loose-fitting clothing is a must Around 25°C (77°F): warm bordering on hot; above this temperature it's probably going to be annoying indoors without ventilation or AC, a few degrees more and I'll find it hard to focus while working Roughly 20°C (68°F): "room temperature"; legs and hands may get cold after sitting for prolonged times but otherwise it's warm enough to wear a t-shirt outdoors but too cold for shorts Around 15°C (59°F): a bit chilly; may feel warmer in spring but below this temperature it's probably getting a bit too cold for t-shirts Below 10°C (50°F): cold; you should wear a jacket and with a bit of wind it can get uncomfortable Around 0°C (30°F): freezing point; risk of black ice and there might be snow, so you'll need proper footwear Below -10°C (14°F): very cold; you probably want to invest in proper winter clothing because those jeans might get a bit chilly Below -20°C (-4°F): extremely cold; it doesn't get this cold normally so you're probably not equipped to handle this, time to bring out that winter gear you bought for your last skiing vacation Note that this is aligned with the metric scale because that's what I've grown up with and hence what I've tied my intuitions to. If you looked at the Fahrenheit temperatures in isolation they would seem completely arbitrary so it's not surprising the inverse is true (e.g. 80°F is 26.7°C -- and this also settles the "more increments" argument as Celsius temperatures are usually given with a decimal and rounded in casual conversation).

jmholla 6y ago
> Note that this is aligned with the metric scale because that's what I've grown up with and hence what I've tied my intuitions to. That's a bit unfair. You're coming from Celsius. If someone we're coming from Farenheit, they could round your scale to the nearest tens then complain how Celsius's fractions are so arbitrary for these cutoffs. (Not including your boiling water references since this is about weather.)
- hnbad 6y ago
  That's precisely the point I'm making. I'm presenting the "intuitive" Celsius scale in response to the claim that Fahrenheit is intuitive because my point is that we have the intuition regardless of the exact system of measurement that surrounds us and just tie it to values that feel right and then say the fact these feelings align with those values are evidence that the system is intuitive when there's nothing in those values itself making them more or less intuitive. E.g. to be pedantic, room temperature is usually given as 19°C (66.2°F) and many prefer 21°C (69.8°F) or even 22°C (71.6°F) and I could have also stated my cut-off for unpleasant warmth as around 27°C (80.6°F). Your intuitive scale likely doesn't perfectly line up with either of the two systems but you project it onto whichever you are used to.
  - User23 6y ago
    I’ll add to this that Fahrenheit is human-centric by design. Granted he didn’t get it quite right, but 100 degrees F was meant to be average human body temperature. I’m personally comfortable with both. I prefer customary in the USA and metric in Europe. This is no more uncomfortable for me than speaking English in the USA and one of the other languages I know when in Europe. This might be because I’m native bilingual. I think and dream in both languages. Edit: Interestingly Americans are quite willing to use metric on a syncretic basis in a way somewhat analogous to how polytheistic religions incorporate foreign beliefs. For example Americans are quite comfortable with the liter as a beverage volume. And certain American subcultures actually use the gram as a subunit of the ounce for small masses.
  - jmholla 6y ago
    Sorry, it wasn't clear that you were arguing that they were equally intuitive. It seemed to me you were arguing Celsius is more so.
  - skwirl 6y ago
    These scales are both arbitrary. Celsius is super useful if you are concerned with phase transitions of water in the presence of a gas at 101,325 Pa of pressure - it's hard to do much better, really. But what if we wanted to design a scale for measuring the typical range of air temperatures experienced outside in the temperate climates on Earth? You said you are from northwest Germany, which is a fairly temperate climate - to pick an arbitrary city there, the record low in Bremen is -23.6 C and the record high is 37.6 C. So perhaps for our hypothetical scale for Bremen (let's label its units B) a good range would be to set 0 B to -23.6 C and 100 B to 37.6 C to capture this range. In this scale 0 C would end up being 38.6 B and 100 C would end up being 202 B... values that are curiously close to an existing temperature scale. The B scale would be useful for talking about the outdoor air temperature in Bremen. Would the B temperature scale be useful for talking about atmospheric temperature on Mars? Not any more or less so than C... there's no real inherit advantage to either. The choice you make would likely be based on what your primary audience is more familiar with. If you wanted to force your readers to read a unit that would somehow promote scientific literacy you'd probably go with the Kelvin scale since 0 K is not arbitrary (although the unit magnitude still is).
klyrs 6y ago
Sounds like you're from a warm climate. Unfortunately, comfort level is dependent on local temperatures. Canadians who vacation in Florida love the winters, and traipse about in shorts and sandals while the locals are bundled up in toques and sweaters. 86F/30C is nearly miserable 32F/0C is shorts weather if you'll be moving around at all And I live in balmy Vancouver. But to be fair, our 30 is never dry, and some locals bundle up when it's 15.
- u801e 6y ago
  > 86F/30C is nearly miserable > 32F/0C is shorts weather if you'll be moving around at all That really depends on the wind, humidity and the amount of sunlight. I don't live that far north or south, but I certainly wouldn't consider freezing shorts weather or 30 °C/86 °F miserably hot.
- simonblack 6y ago
  Pleasant 32C Autumn morning. Shorts and T-Shirt is every-day-of-the-year uniform. Cairns, Tropical Queensland, Australia. Mind you, in mid-winter it sometimes gets down to a chilly 12C over-night. (Well, maybe for a few days a year.)
- hnbad 6y ago
  Yeah, that's why I specified my location and climate. Except for things like the boiling and freezing point most of these are highly subjective. My point is that what specific temperatures we align them with is not only subjective but also somewhat arbitrary depending on whichever scale we're used to. If I lived in a region that uses Fahrenheit, I'd probably have picked values that are nice round numbers in Fahrenheit instead of Celsius.

by hnbad 6y ago

jmholla 6y ago

> Note that this is aligned with the metric scale because that's what I've grown up with and hence what I've tied my intuitions to. That's a bit unfair. You're coming from Celsius. If someone we're coming from Farenheit, they could round your scale to the nearest tens then complain how Celsius's fractions are so arbitrary for these cutoffs. (Not including your boiling water references since this is about weather.)

hnbad 6y ago
That's precisely the point I'm making. I'm presenting the "intuitive" Celsius scale in response to the claim that Fahrenheit is intuitive because my point is that we have the intuition regardless of the exact system of measurement that surrounds us and just tie it to values that feel right and then say the fact these feelings align with those values are evidence that the system is intuitive when there's nothing in those values itself making them more or less intuitive. E.g. to be pedantic, room temperature is usually given as 19°C (66.2°F) and many prefer 21°C (69.8°F) or even 22°C (71.6°F) and I could have also stated my cut-off for unpleasant warmth as around 27°C (80.6°F). Your intuitive scale likely doesn't perfectly line up with either of the two systems but you project it onto whichever you are used to.
- User23 6y ago
  I’ll add to this that Fahrenheit is human-centric by design. Granted he didn’t get it quite right, but 100 degrees F was meant to be average human body temperature. I’m personally comfortable with both. I prefer customary in the USA and metric in Europe. This is no more uncomfortable for me than speaking English in the USA and one of the other languages I know when in Europe. This might be because I’m native bilingual. I think and dream in both languages. Edit: Interestingly Americans are quite willing to use metric on a syncretic basis in a way somewhat analogous to how polytheistic religions incorporate foreign beliefs. For example Americans are quite comfortable with the liter as a beverage volume. And certain American subcultures actually use the gram as a subunit of the ounce for small masses.
- jmholla 6y ago
  Sorry, it wasn't clear that you were arguing that they were equally intuitive. It seemed to me you were arguing Celsius is more so.
- skwirl 6y ago
  These scales are both arbitrary. Celsius is super useful if you are concerned with phase transitions of water in the presence of a gas at 101,325 Pa of pressure - it's hard to do much better, really. But what if we wanted to design a scale for measuring the typical range of air temperatures experienced outside in the temperate climates on Earth? You said you are from northwest Germany, which is a fairly temperate climate - to pick an arbitrary city there, the record low in Bremen is -23.6 C and the record high is 37.6 C. So perhaps for our hypothetical scale for Bremen (let's label its units B) a good range would be to set 0 B to -23.6 C and 100 B to 37.6 C to capture this range. In this scale 0 C would end up being 38.6 B and 100 C would end up being 202 B... values that are curiously close to an existing temperature scale. The B scale would be useful for talking about the outdoor air temperature in Bremen. Would the B temperature scale be useful for talking about atmospheric temperature on Mars? Not any more or less so than C... there's no real inherit advantage to either. The choice you make would likely be based on what your primary audience is more familiar with. If you wanted to force your readers to read a unit that would somehow promote scientific literacy you'd probably go with the Kelvin scale since 0 K is not arbitrary (although the unit magnitude still is).

klyrs 6y ago

Sounds like you're from a warm climate. Unfortunately, comfort level is dependent on local temperatures. Canadians who vacation in Florida love the winters, and traipse about in shorts and sandals while the locals are bundled up in toques and sweaters. 86F/30C is nearly miserable 32F/0C is shorts weather if you'll be moving around at all And I live in balmy Vancouver. But to be fair, our 30 is never dry, and some locals bundle up when it's 15.

u801e 6y ago
> 86F/30C is nearly miserable > 32F/0C is shorts weather if you'll be moving around at all That really depends on the wind, humidity and the amount of sunlight. I don't live that far north or south, but I certainly wouldn't consider freezing shorts weather or 30 °C/86 °F miserably hot.
simonblack 6y ago
Pleasant 32C Autumn morning. Shorts and T-Shirt is every-day-of-the-year uniform. Cairns, Tropical Queensland, Australia. Mind you, in mid-winter it sometimes gets down to a chilly 12C over-night. (Well, maybe for a few days a year.)
hnbad 6y ago
Yeah, that's why I specified my location and climate. Except for things like the boiling and freezing point most of these are highly subjective. My point is that what specific temperatures we align them with is not only subjective but also somewhat arbitrary depending on whichever scale we're used to. If I lived in a region that uses Fahrenheit, I'd probably have picked values that are nice round numbers in Fahrenheit instead of Celsius.