I’m not sure I agree with the take for farenheit. It’s an arbitraty choice, and to me who grew up in a country that uses celsius, I find that far easier to understand and farenheit may as well be random numbers to me.
Fahrenheit was not an entirely arbitrary choice: it was defined based on two points of reference that could be measured at the time: the freezing temperature of an ammonium chloride brine is used as 0, and the best estimate for the average human body temperature is set at 96.
Over time, as the freezing point and boiling point of water at sea level atmospheric pressure proves to be more accurate reference points, the Fahrenheit scale was adjusted to provide exact conversion to Celsius.
Are you telling me they were able to measure those things, but not the boiling and freezing point of water?
Sure, let me just whip up that ammonium chloride mixture and travel somewhere where I can get it close to freezing so I can know the zero reference of that scale. What, did the just carry that NH₄Cl around for convenience?
Fahrenheit was proposed in 1724, Celsius dates back to 1742, so there wasn’t that much time between the two.
Boiling point of water varies based on atmospheric pressure, water boils at a lower temperature high up in the mountains, for example, which could be why the estimated human body temperature is set as a standard, because it is consistent to reproduce as long as there are people around.
The freezing point of water is not affected by atmospheric pressure, however, it is affected by dissolved material in the water. Using a saturate solution of a salt would establish that consistency as well as lower the freezing point to create a bigger temperature range.
Does ammonium chloride brine not freeze at different pressures?
A bit of mistake I made there, I should say that the freezing point is relatively unaffected by pressure compared to the boiling point, and the amount of dissolved impurities are going to have a greater effect.
Whatever your grew up with will always seem more intuitive for most people. But given that I grew up with Fahrenheit, the whole “0 is cold as fuck, 100 is hot as fuck” thing works for me.
Farenheit is asking Americans how hot they feel.
Do Americans feel heat differently or something?
They’re one of only 3 countries in the world who still use °F, and represent 98% of the population who do so. So it’s basically just America.
