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Comic strip of a ghost and a person with the American flag pasted on the head. The ghost repeats “Boo!” in the first three panels without getting any reaction, but when it in the fourth panel says “kg, cm, km, °C” the American gets scared and screams “AHHHH!!!”.

Edit: fixed alt text

    • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 year ago

      100°F is roughly (like really roughly) the hottest temp your likely to see in most temperate climates throughout a year. 0°F is(again really roughly) the lowest. The result is you can use Fahrenheit basically as a percentage, or a 0 to 100 temperature score to help you decide how to dress/prepare for the day. If the temperature is above or below 100 or 0 then you need to consider fairly serious precautions before going outside for any length of time.

      It’s not a very precise system at all, and it obviously has no place in a laboratory or similar situation. But it does work quite well for communicating the weather to common people. There is very little desire among Americans to change to Celsius not because they don’t understand it (we’re all taught Celsius in grade school) but because Fahrenheit serves most people’s needs perfectly adequately.

      OP is also arguing that easily recalling the boiling temperature of water (one of the big purported advantages of Celsius) is useless for most people as nobody actually measures the temperature of water while boiling it. Except, maybe, in a classroom, probably while demonstrating to children how the Celsius scale works.

    • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]@hexbear.net
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      1 year ago

      If it’s 0 F, it’s 0% hot out. If it’s 50 F, it’s 50% hot out, if it’s 100F, it’s 100% hot out.

      It’s a more human measurement. Who the hell knows how long a kilometer or meter is? Everyone knows what a football field looks like and a yard is 1/100th of it.

      • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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        1 year ago

        I mean… I could say the same thing about Celsius and it would make the exact same amount of sense.

          • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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            1 year ago

            100°C is an acceptable sauna temperature. You won’t last much longer naked in 0°C!

            Edit: To make my point more clear, I know some crazy people who go directly from a close to 100 degree sauna to a close to 0 degree ice bath. I think that could be described quite well as going from 100 to 0 % within the human temperature tolerance.

            Also, that’s not my initial point. My initial point was that “percent hot outside” means nothing in Fahrenheit or Celsius.

            (whoops, pressed delete instead of edit)

        • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          It has never been literally boiling outside (except for when you’re in the middle of a forest fire or next to a lava flow).

          Besides, Fahrenheit is more scientific because it translates 1:1 to Rankine, where 0 is absolute zero.

          • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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            1 year ago

            Percent of what, exactly? It has been a lot more than 100 Fahrenheit and a lot less than 0.

            Edit: Kelvin is the scientific standard with 0 at absolute zero, and that translates directly to Celsius.

              • Masimatutu@lemm.eeOP
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                1 year ago

                Are you just trolling? “100% hot out” literally doesn’t mean anything.

                Edit: Ah, I see :P

                But the human body temp isn’t 100 °F, though

      • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
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        1 year ago

        The heck is 50% hot out? How is that even helpful lmao

        28°c is a nice weather but 82.4°f(or 82.4% hot) sounds unlivable.

        • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 year ago

          Lol 82.4°F is hot af. Depending on the humidity it could be quite uncomfortable.

          Truly unlivable would be anything over 100.

          50 is fairly mild. Cool, but not really cold at all. Long sleeves, pants, maybe a light jacket weather.

          • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
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            1 year ago

            No it’s not, as i live in the equator, and that’s the issue i have with fahrenheit. The whole thing is devoid of context and people think it makes sense naturally.

            • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              1 year ago

              Are you trying to say people can live in a sauna? The whole point is they’re so hot you can’t (safely) stay in them too long.

              I’m obviously not saying that people spontaneously combust above that temp.

        • halfeatenpotato@lonestarlemmy.mooo.com
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          1 year ago

          82.4°f is pretty decent weather. Unlivable is more like 100°f+, hence the “100% hot” scale. Nice weather would be 75°f, which makes sense when you think of it in terms of the “0-100% hot” scale.

          I agree that other things like distance, volume, etc are better in metric. I really wish the US would just standardize metric UOM in general. But I do think fahrenheit is better for temperature.

      • SolarNialamide@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Who the hell knows how long a kilometer or meter is?

        Everyone outside of America.

        Everyone knows what a football field looks like

        You’re either trolling or a living embodiment of the ‘Americans think the USA is the whole world’ meme. Nobody outside of the USA knows how long a football field is.

      • doggle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 year ago

        I get what you’re saying, but only people who live in a country where (American) football is played would know how big a football field is.