I was glad to read this, I’ve thought every thermometer I’ve ever had was inaccurate when I get readings like 97.5 all the time…
Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
21–30 of 148 posts
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even “around” is meaningless without context. A hot day is around 37c (+/- 10), a healthy person is around 37c (+/- 1) and a manufacturing process could call for a temp around 37c (+/- 0.1).
The accuracy is implied in the nimber of dogots usually. So 37 is +-1C, 40 is +-10, and 36.6 is +-0.1
I was googling 'nimber' and 'dogot' because I thought it was some obscure but extremely relevant concept that I didn't know about.
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
The accuracy is implied in the nimber of dogots usually. So 37 is +-1C, 40 is +-10, and 36.6 is +-0.1
Doesn’t work great when you want high precision on a number that ends with zeros or have a range that’s not a multiple of ten. The real answer is standard deviation or something like that.
Scientific notation is the answer to this problem.
3.00 * 10^3
versus
3 * 10^3
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#24In Poland normal has always been considered 36.6C, which is 97.9F, which the article states as a proposed new normal.
Same in Russia, Ukraine, and other former USSR countries AFAIK
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#25I was glad to read this, I’ve thought every thermometer I’ve ever had was inaccurate when I get readings like 97.5 all the time…
Same here. Usually around 96.6F oral.
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#26As the article says, Wunderlich reached a conclusion of 37C in the 1800s, and that’s what we’ve used since then. The real problem appears to be that converting to Fahrenheit and reporting this as “98.6F” suggests an order of magnitude more precision than “37C”. 36.5C would still round to 37 but corresponds to 97.7F.
I have always been taught that 37C is the upper limit, actually bordering on fever. So 36.5C or even a bit lower was always considered healthy and fine.
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even “around” is meaningless without context. A hot day is around 37c (+/- 10), a healthy person is around 37c (+/- 1) and a manufacturing process could call for a temp around 37c (+/- 0.1).
The accuracy is implied in the nimber of dogots usually. So 37 is +-1C, 40 is +-10, and 36.6 is +-0.1
>The accuracy is implied in the number of digits usually.
>So 37 is +-1C
Yeah, but this doesn't work for human bodies when you round 36.5 either up to 37 or down to 36.
* 38C is surely fever, 37 is mild fever for most people;
* 36C is below-normal for most people, and 35C is surely hypothermia.
36.5 - 37C is the normal temperature range.
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Doesn’t work great when you want high precision on a number that ends with zeros or have a range that’s not a multiple of ten. The real answer is standard deviation or something like that.
Sure it does. 10000 and 10000.000 have vastly different precision.
10,000 doesn’t disambiguate between an error of 1, 10, 100 or 1000.
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#29Not sure if it's all the countries, but I have always heard the normal body temperature in Celsius stated as 36.5, which is 97.7 F. Is 98.6 an american-only thing?
50 years ago, I was taught 36.6C is normal. The thermometers we used, back then, had a mark at 36.6C.
Re: Time to redefine normal body temperature? (2020)
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
The accuracy is implied in the nimber of dogots usually. So 37 is +-1C, 40 is +-10, and 36.6 is +-0.1
I was googling 'nimber' and 'dogot' because I thought it was some obscure but extremely relevant concept that I didn't know about.
The obscure, but extremely relevant concept is the English QWERTY keyboard layout, which places U, I, and O next to each other and makes typos like this more likely when you touch-type with two hands :)