The polar vortex is hitting the brakes • Hacker News Board

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#51

Post by chrismcb » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:49 PM UTC

inetknght wrote: post #46

artursapek wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

Nah, Celsius is useful if you're a human. Fahrenheit is useful if you're an American.

If you are used to Celsius, sure. But the point the op was making is Fahrenheit was designed with humans in mind and Celsius with the changes of the state of water. Your average person didn't really care what temperature water boils at, just that it is hot.

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#52

Post by NortySpock » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:49 PM UTC

artursapek wrote: post #44

Supersaiyan_IV wrote: post #37

Doing climate research in Fahrenheit in 2025 gives me second hand embarrassment.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

30 is hot.

20 is nice.

10 is cold.

0 is ice.

Not hard to remember for converting Celsius to how humans typically perceive temperature.

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#53

Post by steve_adams_86 » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:51 PM UTC

thegreatpeter wrote: post #24

phkahler wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it'll be interesting if they privatize weather forecasting in the US. I'll be looking for European forecasts of US weather... It's handy info, but I'm not gonna subscribe to see if I need a coat or umbrella.

Why would "they" privatize the weather? How dramatic.

Why wouldn’t they?

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#54

Post by timschmidt » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:51 PM UTC

inetknght wrote: post #46

artursapek wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

Nah, Celsius is useful if you're a human. Fahrenheit is useful if you're an American.

Who needs 2x the effective resolution at human temperature scales? Or useful temperatures without significant digits beyond the decimal?

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#55

Post by rpastuszak » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:52 PM UTC

tremon wrote: post #48

artursapek wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

What significance does 0°F have to a human?

?

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#56

Post by mempko » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:52 PM UTC

downrightmike wrote: post #26

Ultimately the Earth will warm up, the ice caps melt, the coasts lose as the seas rise 10m

And potentially organized human life collapses

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#57

Post by typewithrhythm » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:52 PM UTC

artursapek wrote: post #44

Supersaiyan_IV wrote: post #37

Doing climate research in Fahrenheit in 2025 gives me second hand embarrassment.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

Humans cannot reliably determine the difference in one degree c, even though it's bigger... Fahrenheit is too fine grained, and has no interesting points relative to the things I interact with. I freeze an boil water often, however

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#58

Post by artursapek » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:53 PM UTC

NortySpock wrote: post #52

artursapek wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

30 is hot. 20 is nice. 10 is cold. 0 is ice. Not hard to remember for converting Celsius to how humans typically perceive temperature.

Cool yeah let's compress the entire scale to 0-35 and waste the other 65 up to 100 lol yeah what a great scale

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#59

Post by timschmidt » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:53 PM UTC

NortySpock wrote: post #52

artursapek wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celsius is useful if you're a beaker of water. Fahrenheit is useful if you're a human.

30 is hot. 20 is nice. 10 is cold. 0 is ice. Not hard to remember for converting Celsius to how humans typically perceive temperature.

My problem isn't remembering the scale, it's that Fahrenheit offers me double the effective resolution and descriptive accuracy without awkward decimal points in the numbers used.

I like my room at 73F, not 72F or 74F, and I can feel the difference. That's 22.77C. :-/

Re: The polar vortex is hitting the brakes

#60

Post by beAbU » Sat, Mar 22, 2025, 10:54 PM UTC

artursapek wrote: post #49

inetknght wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, Celsius is useful if you're a human. Fahrenheit is useful if you're an American.

0 is cold as fuck, 100 is hot as fuck. Perfect human scale. Stay jelly

-40 - cold as fuck, 40 - hot as fuck. 0 - shit freezes, better drive carefully.

I don't understand why this is always breought out when farenheit is criticized, as if the 0F-100F thing is the "killer app" for temperature scales.