Earlier quoted context omitted.
Some people having cars != everyone having cars.
But the claim wasn't everyone having cars, it was "They are in a city with ... no cars."
If 1% of people have access to cars it’s pretty close to “no cars”.
The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
321–330 of 414 posts
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#322This post appears to be fully within the Hacker News "approach to comments" and "site guidelines". The atmospheric temperature discussed as dangerous has been common in many parts of the earth for many years and is not nearly new. The real threat discussed is from heavy consideration of "business-as-usual RCP8.5 emissions scenario" and that is based on climate models evaluating the future, 2050+, effects of human sou…
If you posted this in the 90s, it still would be a terrible, uneducated post. Read this, all of it, then come back here and make your argument again: https://www.ipcc.ch/assessment-report/ar6/
Resolving at least what is in my post is much easier than working through the IPCC's reports:
It's simple, really simple, just as in my post:
Observational data: The main observational data used to argue the dangerous effects of CO2 is just the 800,000 years of ice core data. But just looking at that data, as I explained in fine detail, that data does not support the claimed effects of CO2.
Models. Again as I explained carefully, so far the climate models have been proven wrong by reality and, in particular, have no predictive value and, thus, are not good science.
Net, there is nothing credible in data or models that says human sources of CO2 will cause significant warming.
In particular, the IPCC has no data or models that do better.
If you want to make an argument for being alarmed, I can do better than the IPCC: We don't really know what CO2 will do. In particular we have no data or models that are credible and say that we are safe.
I have shown, in just one simple post, that the alarmists don't have credible evidence. But I have not shown that we are safe.
Now the next real question is, what to do when we don't have any credible evidence that we are safe or not.
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#323Earlier quoted context omitted.
> please, don't nitpick, I am aware of wet bulb thermometers I don’t want to nitpick. Everything you wrote is correct as far as I know. I only want to add to it. I think understanding what a wet bulb thermometer is crucial to understand the term. And it is a very simple thing: you take a totally normal thermometer, you put it in the shade. So far everything is normal, this is how you measure air temperature since for…
Yes, this is completely correct. I would add the wet bulb thermometer needs large evaporation area (so the sock cannot be too wet and definitely you can't put it in the bucket) and/or some airflow around it. Otherwise it will show some temperature between actual dry bulb and wet bulb temperatures. In practice, nobody seriously uses wet bulb thermometers outside of school experiments because they are such a PITA. It i…
>nobody seriously uses wet bulb thermometers outside of school experiments because they are such a PITA. It is easier to just measure dry bulb temperature and humidity
How is humidity typically measured? I was under the assumption a hygrometer uses both dry and wet bulb measurements.
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#324Similar question to this that I've been wondering this wildfire season -- at what point is AQI (Air Quality Index) too severe for human tolerance? The scale tops out at 500, what happens to a person if the air is even worse than that? Some sensors near Medford, OR are reading in the upper 400's and even low 500's -- what happens if it hits what would be the 1000's if the scale went that high? I'm mostly thinking of p…
Due to local geography trapping wildfire smoke, last week SLC, UT, USA hit over 200 and even walking to the mailbox without a mask on was uncomfortable. My friends were wearing N95s and respirators when walking to their cars and using the recirculation setting. My HVAC filter was dark with smoke particles.
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#325The gloom and doom posts on HN seem to be increasing lately. I can go to CNN if I want this kind of content. That being said I would be ok with posts talking about fixing climate change especially if it preserves human rights and dignity.
Don't worry about it. All this "doom and gloom" stuff will only affect the poor in far away countries. It'll be decades before it seriously impacts your way of life.
I hope it does impact rich countries soon though. That's the only way they'll take the problem seriously without pushing vague ideals like "human rights and dignity"
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#326Earlier quoted context omitted.
And people START dying, en masse, at 28C wet bulb (see chicago and vancouver heat waves)
> en masse I'm not sure that phrase means what you think it means... Yes, there were ~600 tragic deaths in BC from the heat dome, but en masse means 'as a whole' or 'as a group', and a .012% death rate does not really qualify there.
If you understand French you'd know it just means in large quantities.
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#327Here's a discussion of heat index and wet-bulb temps, with records from around the world.
https://www.wunderground.com/blog/weatherhistorian/record-de...
The most dangerous / frequent occurrences seem to be measured in the middle east near shallow gulf coasts. Appleton Wisconsin holds the continental US record, apparently?
This is from 2011.
Here: https://www.weather.gov/jetstream/hi
says:
> The highest dew points, and therefore the highest heat indices are usually found near warm bodies of water.
> In the world, the warmest water is found in the Persian Gulf where the water temperature typically reaches up to 90°F (32°C) in summer. Therefore dew points will be that high as well.
> The highest dew point ever recorded, 95°F (35°C), was recorded at Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, on July 8, 2003. With an air temperature of 108°F (42°C) the heat index was 178°F (81°C).
> In the United States, the highest dew point ever recorded, 90°F (32°C), was recorded at the New Orleans Naval Air Station, on July 30, 1987, Melbourne, Florida on July 12, 1987. Heat indices were in the 130's°F (50's°C).
> Appleton, Wisconsin also had a 90°F (32°C) dew point on July 13, 1995 with a heat index of 149°F (65°C)."
So, it happened once.
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#328Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wet bulb temperature doesn’t have anything to do with air conditioning, unless you’re only talking about evaporative coolers.
Fair. Cooling towers in commercial HVAC use evaporative cooling. Residential cooling doesn't, but still has to exchange heat to a system above the load it common transfers. I think it may be worse in these situations, but I am not sure.
Sure, but the water in commercial AC is just to cool the compressor coils. It still uses a phase change system like any other AC, so it’s not limited by the wet bulb temperature (although the warmer the ambient temperature is, the less efficient it is).
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#329Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Combined with power outages, as happens in the book, everyone living under such a heat wave will likely die. That's an exaggeration. Extreme heat (including heat waves that exceed this threshold) happen semi-regularly, and the death rate when they occur is nowhere near 100%. More like 0.1% or less. Electrically-powered air conditioning is not the only way to cool a human body. Simply escaping to an underground or s…
> Extreme heat (including heat waves that exceed this threshold) happen semi-regularly The threshold is wet bulb 35 for 7 hours. That is when fit young humans can't survive. Older people die well before that of course. And no, it doesn't happen regularly. I wasn't aware it had happened at all, although others here say it has. But it has come close. From https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people...…
Here's a discussion of heat index and wet-bulb temps, with records from around the world.
https://www.wunderground.com/blog/weatherhistorian/record-de...
The most dangerous / frequent occurrences seem to be measured in the middle east near shallow gulf coasts. Appleton Wisconsin holds the continental US record, apparently?
This is from 2011.
This looks more updated: https://www.weather.gov/jetstream/hi
and says:
> The highest dew points, and therefore the highest heat indices are usually found near warm bodies of water.
> In the world, the warmest water is found in the Persian Gulf where the water temperature typically reaches up to 90°F (32°C) in summer. Therefore dew points will be that high as well.
> The highest dew point ever recorded, 95°F (35°C), was recorded at Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, on July 8, 2003. With an air temperature of 108°F (42°C) the heat index was 178°F (81°C).
> In the United States, the highest dew point ever recorded, 90°F (32°C), was recorded at the New Orleans Naval Air Station, on July 30, 1987, Melbourne, Florida on July 12, 1987. Heat indices were in the 130's°F (50's°C).
> Appleton, Wisconsin also had a 90°F (32°C) dew point on July 13, 1995 with a heat index of 149°F (65°C)."
So, it happened once, in Saudi Arabia?
Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)
#330Earlier quoted context omitted.
You’re being unreasonably optimistic. It’s wishful thinking.
How so? What part is unreasonable? I was specifically questioning things like where is the hot water coming from, people without tubs can't figure out how to save water, etc. Those claims sound overly pessimistic and simplistic to me.
It's not about saving water, it's about immersing yourself in water. You seem to have a different natural disaster in mind.