Why does moving air feel cool? Doesn’t movement generate heat?

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And how do warm winds happen? Why are they ‘breaking’ the cool breeze rule?

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3 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Most of the time, the air around us is cooler than we are, or we’re sweating. Moving air replaces the air next to our skin that we’ve warmed up and helps evaporate sweat, which cools us down.

If the air is hotter than us, or the humidity is so high that sweating doesn’t work, it feels hot.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Heat is transferred from the body to the air in most situations, like if the air is cooler than the body or has a low enough humidity to transfer heat through sweating.

More air exposed to the skin through wind/fans = more air to remove heat.

Wind can be warm if it’s just warmer than body temp. There’s no rule that breezes need to be cool. As long as the same processes that cause wind can happen, they can be whatever temp.

It is possible to have air so warm and humid that neither sweat or convective cooling(the method of air removing heat without sweating) work, and this is potentially lethal since heat cannot be removed effectively.

Also, moving does warm things up, but most things need a lot more movement and [friction to make a noticeable impact. ](https://what-if.xkcd.com/71/)
Here is a similar “What if?” By the XKCD comic author about warming tea by stirring it. Generally unless you’re going really fast or have very high friction, it doesn’t make a huge difference.

Anonymous 0 Comments

> Doesn’t movement generate heat?

If you’re an SR71, Concorde or similar, very supersonic aircraft, then yes. For the wind speeds you encounter in everyday situations, increased heat transfer and evaporative cooling far exceed the very slight heating effect of moving air. Even in still air, the average gas molecule is moving at close to 1000 mph, so a few extra mph doesn’t make a significant difference. You don’t feel the effects of the high speed molecules because they’re so tiny and they’re all moving randomly in different directions, cancelling each other out. Combined together they create air pressure.