The Benefits of Being Cold • Hacker News Board

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#131

Post by VLM » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 1:43 PM UTC

blackethylene wrote: post #28

sidek wrote: post #24

People's reactions to the cold always astonish me. I spend a lot of time in Canada and Hong Kong. In Canada, it can be 12 C (~53F) and lots of people will be wearing t-shirts and jeans, and it isn't too uncommon to see the odd person wearing shorts. In Hong Kong, 12 C necessitates a cold weather warning, and a fair amount of people die when it drops to 10 C (50F). It would be interesting to try this article's suggest…

In my experience, comparing absolute temperatures across different climate/countries does not give the full picture. I used to live in Paris where it felt warmish when the temperature was around 10C. Now that I live in Hong Kong, 10C feels freezing cold, as you pointed out. Maybe it's related to humidity ? Or maybe it's because there is no indoor heating at all, as seanmcdirmid noted.

"Maybe it's related to humidity"

Dew point. When you sweat your skin will rapidly drop toward the dew point. Where I live it varies thru the year from below 0 to about 80, always below the air temp of course. When you don't sweat your skin approaches the sometimes much warmer air temp.

30 degrees air and 30 degrees dew point right after a snowfall is sweater and pants time. This morning the dew point is only 10 degrees so I have to wear a coat although I didn't need to zip it up. No wind helps.

A highly effective way to get killed doing winter sports is to build up a massive sweat and then completely stop moving before drying out... An air temp of 10 degrees is laughable and more or less comfortable if you're not sweating, but a dew point of 10 degrees if you're all sweaty will quite effectively give you hypothermia and kill you. Or the hypothermia will make you stupid, and then everyone will wonder why the heck a smart guy was walking along the cliff edge etc. Sweating in the cold is very dangerous. I usually don't wear a coat while I snowshoe hike (although I carry it in the backpack), wearing gloves and a hat and goggles but no coat always feels weird for the first time each season but you get used to it quickly.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#132

Post by buro9 » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 1:45 PM UTC

tmmm wrote: post #129

buro9 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd made myself homeless to move on from a place I didn't want to be. I didn't really see the point in staying in a new place I didn't want to be (sitting on a street). I chose to walk cities, talk to people, hitchhike around the UK, and generally see if I could find a life and place I did want. It also means I avoided getting into a rhythm of hostels, soup kitchens, and charity. I know I was homeless and sleeping ro…

What and how much did you eat a day?

Varied greatly, from Pizza Hut all you can eat buffets, through to toast provided by students who let me crash.

For a long time I used Complan and other "off your food" alternatives as supplements to a bad diet - http://www.complan.com/nutritional-info.aspx . Very much like Soylent is doing today, they provided a simple way to get everything you might need. They say to only have one or two per day, I used to consume 2-3 with milk and also add pasta to the mix (I had a camping stove and pasta was my most reliable simple meal).

It varied greatly though, I was homeless for almost two and half years. Diet was something I got wrong a lot before I got it mostly right. I was much healthier when I was sleeping rough than I was when I was living in damp social housing on a diet of whatever my mother could deep fry.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#133

Post by buro9 » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 1:50 PM UTC

billybofh wrote: post #119

tmmm wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always wondered how homeless people deal with cold when I saw them during winter. It's amazing what our bodies can do.

One of our city-based HPC facilities has had a recurring fault where the aircon goes off for no obvious reason overnight. Eventually we figured out that a homeless guy had realised he could sleep above a vent from the aircon and be relatively warm - and had also realised he could turn off the system (it's not very secure) to cut the noise down but still be warm from the heat coming out. At the moment we're just ignor…

This is ace. If I were homeless nowadays this is probably something I would've sought out.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#134

Post by Raphmedia » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:08 PM UTC

dghughes wrote: post #107

tmmm wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always wondered how homeless people deal with cold when I saw them during winter. It's amazing what our bodies can do.

I can't imagine how homeless people here in Canada survive -25C or lower temperatures, combined with wind it could feel like -50C.

I know of a guy that lives in the wood next to my town. Even in harsh winter, you can be quite warm if you can have a fire and snow to build shelter. The poor guys in Montréal don't have that luck and sleep in every corner you can find that cuts the wind.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#135

Post by spydum » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:14 PM UTC

trhway wrote: post #91

eru wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder whether thinking harder does burn more energy. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/thinking-hard-calo... seems to say, not really.

the facts in the article can be interpreted in many ways. Anyway, i was saying it based on my lifelong observations and personal experiences and understanding of how brain works. In short - i've never seen a fat mathematician :)

In my experience, it's not likely because they expend calories thinking, but that they get so emersed into their work, they forget to eat :) lot of good programming folks seem to be the same way

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#136

Post by Karawebnetwork » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:17 PM UTC

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #23

arjie wrote: post #17

As someone who was a grad student in an apartment with poor heating: it's not worth it. Eat appropriately, and exercise. The bloody cold numbs your brain too. I also remember reading, though I can't find a good source now, that programmers perform better when warmer (until a point, maybe 27 degrees C). Besides, exercising feels good, while this feels bad. Might as well enjoy yourself.

Would like to see a source for that claim. 27C is pretty hot and multiple studies have found that temperature to be suboptimal for classroom performance (which may not by indicative of programmer productivity, I guess). "... the performance of two numerical and two language-based tests was significantly improved when the temperature was reduced from 25°C to 20°C (77°F to 68°F)." http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.…

I feel like all this talk is nonsense and people should simply work at the temperature they feel comfortable at. Offices should be at a neutral temperature and provide personal heaters.

I keep my room around 28C during the winter and 35C in the summer. The office I work at is set to 21C. I hate it and feel like I work better when I'm hotter.

I doubt there is a magic number that would have everyone work faster.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#137

Post by viewer5 » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:18 PM UTC

buro9 wrote: post #121

tmmm wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A little bit off-topic, but why were you walking so much? And where did you find so much energy to do so (I presume you would probably need to eat a lot (much more than 2,000 calories) to be able to walk so many miles)?

I'd made myself homeless to move on from a place I didn't want to be. I didn't really see the point in staying in a new place I didn't want to be (sitting on a street). I chose to walk cities, talk to people, hitchhike around the UK, and generally see if I could find a life and place I did want. It also means I avoided getting into a rhythm of hostels, soup kitchens, and charity. I know I was homeless and sleeping ro…

What was your mindset like during that time period? It sounds almost adventurous, the way you wrote your post.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#138

Post by joncrocks » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:20 PM UTC

techrat wrote: post #94

SiVal wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the English first began settling in New England in the 1600s, they were astonished that the local Indian men and boys wore only a loincloth during most of the year, even in snowy weather, adding leggings and a small shawl on the shoulders only in the coldest weeks of the New England winter. I would love to learn more about this adaptation, which has been witnessed in multiple ethnic groups by so many witnesses t…

Also keep in mind that Indians also largely only wore leather. Leather is renowned for its great insulative properties. The other factor is wind exposure. It's easier to stay tolerant of cold when there's no wind. When that wind picks up and starts stripping you of your heat layer, you'll feel it much more even at slightly warmer temps. I grew up in a part of the country that almost never gets cold and moved to chica…

Have a google for chillow, it's a product for having a cold pillow for longer.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#139

Post by marincounty » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:21 PM UTC

buro9 wrote: post #81

I used to dislike the cold, always feeling I suffered greatly from it due to growing up in poverty in the UK and living in damp spaces (mould on the walls, condensation on the window, a cough always a breathe away). Then I was homeless, sleeping rough through UK winters. One does adapt, and fairly quickly too. The first nights I slept out during snowfall I didn't get much sleep as I was shivering too violently and un…

Glad you are not homeless. In school, I read a short story written by Jack London about what it feels like to be really cold--turns out he wrote it on a beach in Hawaii. Forgot the name of the story. When I read the story, I thought it was great literature, but I read it knowing I would never be homeless. As I have aged, and feel more financially vunerable--and sometimes close to being Homeless--these stories about being cold are too close to home.

Re: The Benefits of Being Cold

#140

Post by Retric » Mon, Dec 29, 2014, 2:34 PM UTC

rossriley wrote: post #120

udalov wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you please elaborate on running being damaging?

It's actually an often repeated myth that running is bad for your joints/knees etc[1]. General medical consensus is that moderate running is an indicator for better joint health. [1] http://www.npr.org/2011/03/28/134861448/put-those-shoes-on-r...

"There are caveats, though, especially for people who have suffered significant knee injury or are overweight."

Sure, in moderation it's a small net gain, but few are the correct weight, without injury, and run in moderation.

Note: Simply being tall can have the same effect as being overweight and shorter. The knee supports 3d volume on a 2d surface so it has scaling issues. There is a significant peak load difference between a 5'2" runner and a 6'2" runner.

Edit: "We know from many long-term studies that running doesn't appear to cause much damage to the knees," vs. "In one study, Swedish researchers found that exercise, including jogging, may even be beneficial." So, at best "if you have a relatively normal knee and you're jogging five to six times a week at a moderate pace, then there's every reason to believe that your joints will remain healthy." Which is hardly the same things as saying running is not harmful.