this post was submitted on 09 Sep 2024
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[–] alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml -3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (31 children)

But really it is much better for human temperatures.

It's just intuitive, 0F is 100% cold, and 100F is 100% hot.

When the dry bulb gets above 100F, wind only cools you down by sweat evaporation, and when the wet bulb gets above 100F, even that can't cool you down, and you will die if you don't get to a cooler or drier environment.

[–] IrateAnteater@sh.itjust.works 28 points 1 month ago (15 children)

"Intuitive" is a meaningless metric for a single scaled number. Whichever system you are used to will be the more "intuitive".

Also, climate can play into which system feels more useful. Where I live, 100F occurs only rarely (and since air conditioning is almost ubiquitous, not something I'd bother looking out for), while 0C is an outdoor temperature that I do need to be aware of for half the year.

[–] Donkter@lemmy.world -4 points 1 month ago (14 children)

I disagree that either would be just as intuitive. Fahrenheit being 0=cold and 100=hot is intuitive because there are a lot of things we do in the world that exist on a scale of 0 - 100. Percentages, just off the bat. Also, fahrenheit has a higher degree of fidelity in the temperature range that we use.

Celsius's general temperature scale is like -10 - 40 which is absolutely not intuitive because it doesn't look like any other scale we use as humans. I agree that we get used to Celsius fast and it's a fine it's not like it's super confusing (and Celsius is so much more useful scientifically).

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