Re:A mathematician's way of converting miles to kilometers
by ghaff on Saturday August 10, 2019 @08:47AM
(#20661750)
Sure. Where I live:
1. Fahrenheit is far more likely to cover the range of temperatures I encounter without having to use negative numbers. 0 is really cold. Anything below zero is really freaking cold. The temperature of the boiling point of water is mostly an academic point in my day to day life.
2. Fahrenheit provides about 2x the granularity of Celsius without having to use decimals
I'm not going to argue that if Fahrenheit didn't exist, we'd invent it. But it does have some advantages as an existing system.
ADDED: For engineering using SI units, of course Celsius and Kelvin make a lot more sense.
1. Fahrenheit is far more likely to cover the range of temperatures I encounter without having to use negative numbers. 0 is really cold. Anything below zero is really freaking cold. The temperature of the boiling point of water is mostly an academic point in my day to day life.
2. Fahrenheit provides about 2x the granularity of Celsius without having to use decimals
I'm not going to argue that if Fahrenheit didn't exist, we'd invent it. But it does have some advantages as an existing system.
ADDED: For engineering using SI units, of course Celsius and Kelvin make a lot more sense.