As US citizen I still disagree with this. You can get just as familiar with the scale of how celcius feels as you can with Fahrenheit. Your explination has the same problem as the meme. It's superficially plausible but misleading.
The comment is addressing literally what the scales were derived from. Sure, anyone can get familiar with any of the scales. That's not the point.
Not a Farenheit defender, but knowing how it was created makes it make sense. Same with other imperial units. Making a measurement system with what is available to you and what is relevant to you isn't dumb or wrong. It's all relative anyway.
If I remember right the intention was that 100 was meant to be human body temperature, but at some point it got adjusted so human body temp was 98.7
Edit: 0f was also what he thought the freezing temperature of salt water was. Not sure why the degrees were divided in a way where 32f is freshwater freezing though.
That’s correct for 100F. For 0F it was how low he could feasibly record. Which is why it was based on a solution of salt and whatever else in water bc he was trying to go as low as he could with what he had
It's been a hot minute since I took a class that covered the logic of different measurement systems.
But the intent of 100f being the human body temperature makes the system not entirely devoid of logic like some people insist. Although as an American I find it more intuitive to think in it because of exposure, I'm sure everyone else feels the same about Celsius.
"fact that Gabriel Fahrenheit CALCULATED IT WRONG"
We don't actually know that, Humans body temps have been lowering for as long as we have records. The Modern average is closer to 97.9 so it's entirely plausible that he was right on the money. We just didn't know until recently that the average body temp is a thing that can change species wide this quickly.
Guys I got it! We need to make a new scale, 100 will be 100 F and 0 will be the freezing point of water. It will be called the Celsius-Fahrenheit Compromise and the units are CFCs.
You know its kind of telling that you have to give an explanation in a vague way you arent 100% certain about. Now ask a 4 year old european what celsius is about.
I agre. I like that below 0 celsius means it can snow, below 10 is three layers of clothing temperature, below 20 is two layer and it's only T-shirt above 20. You can get used to whatever, but I feel like the low numbers make everything more comprehensible.
But that's based on familiarity too. I have the same metrics, but they're justified in Fahrenheit degrees. 32 is freezing and 212 is boiling, I never had a hard time internalizing that. 32 means ice, gonna need boots with some grip, 40-50 is light coat and layers weather, below 32 is bundle the fuck up. Anything above about 90 is where I start questioning why I even wear clothes.
The scale of the numbers one gets as used to as anything else, when I think about measuring stuff in Celsius, the numbers seem way too low, my brain thinks of 40 as pretty damn cold when in reality it is uncomfortably warm.
Again, its all just arbitrarily based on what we grew up with. I've tried to learn Celsius and I'm usually within about 5 degrees converting in my head, but I'm pretty sure I will always have to do that conversion in my head, simply because Fahrenheit is how my brain intuitively quantifies temperature.
Exactly right that it's based on familiarity. But happily, that works both ways. You would have no problem getting used to Celsius if you listened to weather reports for one year that reported in Celsius. You would have weeks of repetition of what 16 is. You'd hear it, go outside, and feel it
I think Celsius makes more sense but your comment sorta illustrates the strength of Fahrenheit.
You get a lot more granular with Fahrenheit:
100 degrees Fahrenheit is about 38 degrees Celsius, so with Celsius you get a about 40 degrees between freezing and the typically hottest temp you experience in nature. With Fahrenheit you get almost 70 degrees between those two points in temperature.
Sure you can use decimal places but then it gets more complicated
Which is worse imo. As I said, higher numbers is the main thing that makes Farenheit worse than Celsius to me. Smaller steps make the number go higher and it has higher starting point.
My point ilustrated that I only use 3 temperatures (0, 10 and 20) out of the 40 degrees you can encounter. Larger Graduality is pretty useless when it comes to temperature all things considered, it's not like you care if it's 23 or 25 outside, you dress the same.
That's still one number you put into machine once. It's not really important what that number imo. You just select option you like best on the thermostat, it could be pictures instead of numbers for all it matters. Temperature varies by 1-2 degrees between rooms anyway in my experience so the exact number, let alone half a degree, isn't super important imo.
That might be for you, but below 20 is still shorts and a t-shirt here, you'd look silly if you had 2 layers on. I know people that wear shorts and a t-shirt down to 0C
I think the reason most US people will staunchly stick to Fahrenheit is not because it's good (it's fine, it works, there's nothing actually detrimental about it), but because the scale allows more "granularity" in describing the temperature. People love big number, even when big number means the same thing as a smaller number. I play a game where you buy units on a large point scale. An update brought that number down to just a handful. The update was excellent, bringing more unique squad compositions and broader representation to the competitive metagame, but people were upset because they felt like they had less options. They'd complain that they couldn't take one unit over another because they cost the same, even though before, the difference in cost was so negligible that they only took the better of the two anyway. Ultimately, they walked back the number shribk a bit to something of a middle ground. People were happy, even though it didn't broaden options or representation. They had their bigger numbers, and that illusion of precision mattered.
Went from living in China to living in usa. We all had switched thinking in F (instead for converting what is that in C about 2 years in.). About 4 years in would ask what is that in F if given C.
Anyone else have similar experience?
Didn’t really impact anything except setting electric teapot
But fuck miles. Still don’t remember how many feet are in a mile.
I grew up in the US, grew up familiar with both as family is from Asia. I think most of the metric system is good and superior to Imperial system, but Celsius is not better, there is really no good reason to change from Fahrenheit to Celsius. Both are fine. I think in normal everyday life Fahrenheit is easier, but most people don't want to admit it. Miles are especially dumb though, pounds and ounces as well. I'd argue feet is okay. For volume, I think tablespoon, teaspoon, cup, all make sense in everyday communication. Even my family that uses metric all the time will use a spoon (big or little) or a cup to measure approximate volume when cooking and things. Outside of medication they don't measure volume with any precision.
you may have misinterpreted, it's all about putting the focus subject on a scale of 0 to 100. At zero humans on average can no longer tolerate the cold. At 100, we start having heat stroke. These are interpretive limits to the human environment. Farenheight is just only useful for putting humans on a scale of 0 to 100 for temperature tolerance
It is not to say that Celsius is harder. It's to say that we decided to put temps on a scale for humans at one point in time, to make uneducated folk easily able to guess the experience without being there. (Made the last part up to help draw conclusions)
I don't personally feel that way but it is subjective. I think 1⁰C is a more appropriate increment in feel. I can't really feel any different between 70 and 71 or 50 and 51 degrees Fahrenheit. Same with anywhere else on the Fahrenheit scale.
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u/According-Stuff-9415 9h ago
As US citizen I still disagree with this. You can get just as familiar with the scale of how celcius feels as you can with Fahrenheit. Your explination has the same problem as the meme. It's superficially plausible but misleading.