Or probably the other way around, why do Celsius and Fahrenheit have “degrees” in its unit?
In: 8
When you measure something in “degrees”, that term implies that there isn’t an absolute “starting point”. You’re measuring away from some arbitrary other point.
Neither the Fahrenheit nor Celsius scales, at their time of creation, had absolute starting points. It was assumed that the temperature could be extended up or down infinitely in either direction. So the inventors of these scales simply picked a temperature to call the zero-mark and created an arbitrary temperature difference to call “1 degree”.
This is also apparent in the other common use case for degrees, measuring rotations around circles. Circles don’t have a “start” or “end” point. Every point around a circle is functionally identical to all the others. So you have to pick an arbitrary spot and call it zero, and every angle away from that spot gets measured in degrees. You can wrap around and around that circle infinitely far, either forwards or backwards. The circle just doesn’t end no matter which way you go, so the concept of an absolute starting point is meaningless.
The Kelvin scale is different. It was created after (one could even say in direct response to) the discovery of absolute zero temperature. Now, we don’t have to pick an arbitrary spot and call it zero, because we now actually do have a true, absolute baseline that very definitely, literally means “zero temperature”. So it is now meaningful to talk about having 1 or 10 or 100 “units of temperature” instead of “degrees of temperature”. And the “Kelvin” is that unit.
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