this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2024
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Science Memes

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Seriously. (lemmy.ca)
submitted 1 week ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Celsius tried to fit too much into 100 notches to please big math.

F is more nuanced with more notches, but the ends aren't logical. It coukd be shifted perhaps, but how?

If freezing was moved to 0, then water boiling would be 180

Perhaps C could have had a 200 degree range, then it would be closer to F and not so hard to convert.

But also: Scientists are important and we shouldn't make it too easy, it demeans their work. Maybe make the C scale show water boiling at 183.4521 degrees so scientific calculations are more impressive-looking and respectable.

[–] [email protected] 47 points 1 week ago (2 children)

and not so hard to convert

"Please change the entire world's system to make it easier for the one country that uses a different one"

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

It wouldn't even change the difficulty, really. You'd just wind up multiplying or dividing by 9/10 instead of 9/5.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

America moving zero to Celcius' zero would be better, it would remove one whole step from the calculation

Then if they made their degrees about 9 fifths the size (they could get higher resolution than they'd lose by doing what we do and quoting temperature to one decimal place where needed) it would be dead simple to convert (just change the symbol from °F to °C!)

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The SI unit scales are chosen to fit together to avoid "respectable" scientific calculations.

To heat one milliliter (1 ml) of water one degree Celsius (1 °C) you need one calorie (1 cal) of energy.

Also the dimensions of one milliliter, is one cubic centimeter (1 cm^3), and that amount of water weighs 1 gram (1 g).

Thus 1 liter of water needs 1 kcal of energy to heat up 1 °C.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 week ago

I'm aware, taught that in school.

Also aware of the real world, those things don't mesh the same at altitude.

In theory, reality and theory are the same. In reality, they're not.

I love science when it's not treated like a religion.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 week ago

It's not limited to 100 steps. The decimal system gives you infinite granularity.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

then it would be closer to F and not so hard to convert.

So few countries use Fahrenheit that this shouldn't even be a consideration