I know this title sounds crazy but I don’t know how to phrase my question better
In: 5716
A thermometer isn’t feeling like we are. Modern ones use an electrical sensor has known reactions to certain temperatures. For example each degree difference from 20 adds or subtracts 0.1 resistance.
If the thing is neutral at 20° and resistance is 1.0, we know that when resistance is 1.5 it must be 25°..by measuring the resistance, we know the temperature.
Your body on the other hand has specialized nerves that detect warming and cooling, then feeds that into your brain. So let’s say it’s, 10°C. Your earm receptors report “Yeah, nothing special happening here, we’re doing our usual thing” and your cold receptors are like “eh, it’s a bit crisp but we’re not detecting anything crazy” Then your brain sets it out and decides, yeah it’s cooling more than it’s warming but we’re at a small difference, doesn’t matter.
If it’s 10°C but there’s strong wind, this is going to mean your warming receptors saying “Hey man, I’m trying here but we aren’t warming at all!” Since the wind is sweeping away that thermic boundary of sir you’ve warmed around yourself. Meanwhile your cold receptors are going gangbusters “Hey. We’re detecting massive cooling here, like, ITS INSANE!” There your brain says “Okay, it’s 10°C but I’m getting massive cooling, we’re losing heat and have no warming at all? Yeah it feels like it’s probably closer to 4°C.
The thermometer just measures the average energy of all the molecules hitting it.
You are a lump of fatty meat getting signals from all over your bone mech, which is covered in meat and systems for circulating fluid and regulating temperature, among many other things.
Remember that in the winter, we are warmer than the air around us, and what we feel as cold is the heat leaving our body trying to put us and the air at the same temperature.
The wind speeds that process up. “Feels like” is the temperature it would have to be for your heat to leave your body that fast without the help of the wind.
A thermometer however has no body heat, so it is already at the temperature of the air around it, and doesn’t go below.
This never made sense to me.
The “feels like” is always presented as an after thought when (to me) it is far more important. I don’t care what the actual temperature outside is. I want to know what it should feel like if/when I step out.
How my dad explains it is that 20 degrees is 20 degrees no matter what, but wind chill just speeds up how fast your body temperature is dropping to 20 degrees. It “feels” colder because you’re getting colder faster, but at the end of the day it’s still 20 degrees outside. Thermometers don’t have a core body temp to regulate, they just measure the ambient temperature
Latest Answers