• deikoepfiges_dreirad@lemmy.zip
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    5 months ago

    “Arbitrary scale at which water freezes” is such an annoyingly dumb representation of the Fahrenheit scale, that even as a European I feel the need to defend it.

  • nowitsabby@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    5 months ago

    I generally agree that metric is better, but there’s an argument for Fahrenheit.

    It was based on human body temperature, so its easier to inuit if a temperature “feels hot”

    • BCsven@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      How? it is just numbers, there is no human relation. i grew up learning both measures. i know that 20C is comfortable the same at 68F is comfortable. If anything C makes more sense, at 0 things are going to want to freeze on my body. For F that is 32…an arbitrary value

      • Malgas@beehaw.org
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        5 months ago

        IIRC the original reference temperatures for Farenheit were ice brine (0°) and human body temperature (100°).

        Nowadays it’s formally defined in relation to Kelvin.

        • BCsven@lemmy.ca
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          5 months ago

          The ice brine was actual a unique solution the guy establish to freeze at zero, not saltwater like I was originally taught, so it was completely arbitrary 0. And the body temp for normal people is 97.5 to 98. It feela like the dude wanted a 0-100 scale and tweaked the whole thing to suit his desire.

      • h3ndrik@feddit.de
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        5 months ago

        Sure. Kelvin is the proper scale. Celsius is just water from freezing to boiling at some atmospheric pressure divided into 100 units. Not because there’s anything absolute to it, but because water is kind of important in our lives.

        • oktoberpaard@feddit.nl
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          5 months ago

          Exactly. I once visited a seed bank and there was some text along the lines of “we store these seeds at -60 °C which is 3 times as cold as your typical freezer” (for Americans: a freezer typically is about -20 °C). Yeah, no, that’s not how it works. With Kelvin you can actually do math like that, because 0 K is the absence of heat zero thermal energy.

    • Nik282000@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      0-50f is cold enough to kill you by exposure, 75f is comfortable, 100f is uncomfortable, higher than 100f can kill you. Seems kinda arbitrary to me.

      • illi@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        Sounds like it goes from “can kill you” to “can kill you”. Kinda important milestones

      • dafo@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        75 F is not comfortable at all, 80 F is deadly, 170 - 200 is fine as long as it’s about 400% rel humidity and in a wooden room

        Kind regards, a nord

    • Owljfien@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      Sure there’s an argument, but it’s a terrible one and you should feel bad for even making it

  • urska@lemmy.ca
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    5 months ago

    After the dutch and indian language, Americans are the second thing I hate the most in the world. God its almost unhealthy.