4 ms·

> 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

> 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).

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).