Why the US is destined for failure and doesn't even know it yet.

[MOBIUS]

The country is so resolutely stuck in the past that it's going to be left behind. It still uses the outmoded and anachronistic Fahrenheit and Imperial measurement scales for Christ's sake - not to mention still being overwhelmingly religious when most countries in the west are 'seeing the light' and realising god doesn't exist...

Get with the times, boys! This is 2014, not 1724!

Discuss.

[MikeH]

1/10

[MOBIUS]

Do you disagree with me that Fahrenheit is a silly temperature measurement scale when compared to Celsius?

[N35t0r]

Except when it's -40

[rah]

Ok, I'll bite.

Since weather reports never used .5 degrees using Fahrenheit is actually more accurate than Celsius.

[Hauldren Collider]

Fahrenheit has a better resolution along the range of temperatures people generally experience.

[MikeH]

That would only be important if we were sensitive enough to be able to distinguish between a single degree temperature.

As I see lots of news reports on US TV shows saying that the temperature would be e.g. mid-seventies, it suggests that the accuracy of an individual degree in Farenheit isn't important.

[rah]

Not critical but a difference none the less. What makes Celsius superior? Your experience with it is about all it comes down to. For day to day, the boiling point of water is a useless reference so it comes down to freezing. 32 or 0. Big deal. It comes down to what you're used to. Most of us prefer here that 0 means it's actually cold outside. 32 isn't really cold to us. It's just a preference so the accuracy while not critical is really the only difference.

[MikeH]

It makes sense for people to be using, in every day use, the units they will encounter in science and in the rest of the world.

Use of farenheit on a weather map is certainly less important than changing to things like meters and kilograms though.

[MikeH]

Celsius makes sense in science because of the way it makes the arithmetic so much easier when combined with other SI units.

Kids in the US must have to learn 2 schemes, imperial for normal use and metric for science? Just seems pointless.

[Hauldren Collider]

It's really not hard to learn both scales. Celsius is pretty simple. 0 is freezing, 100 is boiling. Easy enough to remember. In the meantime, Fahrenheit is a lot more convenient for temperatures people generally experience day-to-day. 70 is room temperature, 32 is freezing, 100 is ****ing hot as ****, and -10 is freezing your nuts off cold.

[MikeH]

Why do you need 30 degrees to cover from warm to hot? Seems overkill. Celsius is totally adequate to cover human experience, so it's still redundant to have Farenheit just for daily weather.

A useful human temperature scale would have 1 degree per clothing change required I reckon.

10 = you'll die if you go outside.
9 = stay in shelter where possible
8 = bare chest
7 = shorts and t shirts
6 = long sleeves
5 = jumper or light jacket
4 = coat
3 = coat, hat and gloves
2 = specialist winter coat
1 = polar exploration gear
0 = you'll die if you go outside.

Any additional resolution above that is pointless for humans. Celsius is already too high resolution, so Farenheit is even more pointless.

[MikeH]

You do know that in my lifetime (and MOBIUS') the UK moved from Farenheit on weather forecasts to Celsius right? So we both have personal experience of both being used every day.

And both of us at a time when, at school, we'd be learning in SI and the weather would be show in in Farenheit, the change happened when I was school age.

I can guarantee you lose no useful information with the reduced resolution, it's actually better because the difference in a degree or two is actually more meaningful, and it definitely helps with perspective on science learning to use the same scale every day.

So, I'm not just making this up, we have gone through the transition.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

From 21 to 27 I can tell a difference in Celsius pretty much - 24 is where it's at for me in shorts and t-shirt, 25 warm, 26 starting to sweat, 27 hot... similar going the other way, 23, chilly but OK, 22, cold after an hour or two, 21 - freezing after an hour or two - have to dress up. Below/above that scale I need about 3 degrees to tell much of a difference... all in all like this:

37+ = death inducing without air con
34-37 = fuuuu ... too much even for beach, have to be in water/somewhere, or die without air-con... 37 was the most that had to live through a few hours without some sort of artificial cooling, not pleasant.
31-34 = very hot, sweating like a pig, but livable, enjoyable on the beach though, but you end up in the water whole day anyway
28-31 = hot, but can still survive without air-con, hard to sit down for longer without leaving a puddle of water below you, still possible to sleep for me without air-con, but not for long...actually 28 is on sort of OK, while 30 not so much, and 31 through the night is the worst I had, long time ago and well... I did sleep 4 hrs, maybe... on the beach though, while sunny - perfect.

27 = starting to sweat sitting down
26 = have to sit still, but nice
25 = warm - lovely
24 = perfect - shorts and t shirt, sitting down ie working
23 = chilly - lovely
22 = cold after a few hours, socks are welcome
21 = freezing after a few hours, have to dress up.

18-21 = need a sweater + trousers
15-18 = cold basically, to sit down, jacket needed - if you are moving, great (dressed as category above)
12-15 = winter coat for sitting down
9-12 = coat for outside, and forget sitting for a long time anywhere, unless dressed like a polar bear
Below that becomes chilly/cold dependable on wind so you better be moving no matter what and lower temps are just "dress up" more category dependable on the conditions and how long you are going to be in them. My low temp record for waiting for someone outside was -25 for about 30 min, no wind, dressing well makes all the difference.

All in all - Celsius is just right from my perspective, enough to tell the difference where it matters.

[Ban Kenobi]

The country is so resolutely stuck in the past that it's going to be left behind. It still uses the outmoded and anachronistic Fahrenheit and Imperial measurement scales for Christ's sake - not to mention still being overwhelmingly religious when most countries in the west are 'seeing the light' and realising god doesn't exist...

Get with the times, boys! This is 2014, not 1724!

Discuss.

I'm guessing that Fahrenheit and God brought down the British Empire?