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Comment by snow_mac | Hacker News Reader

1.5 C sounds like no big deal to me, being the uneducated American I am in terms of the metric system. Once you plug that into a calculator, I get "34.7" F. HOLY CRAP

That's a big change. Imagine Denver's average temp in December is currently 20 and with the change it would be 40-50. That's a MASSIVE change in Denver's ecosystem.

Skiing might not be a thing in Colorado in 5 years. We might be able to grow oranges soon....

- edit -

Apparently I am stupid. The Google Calculator uses the formula: `(1.5°C × 9/5) + 32 = 34.7°F` where as 0C is 32 F.

Therefore it's a 2.7 F change...

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You have done the math wrong, and you do not understand why a 1.5C rise is a big deal.

Hey - at least they're trying

Yeah, that's because your calculation is off by 95% :) It's roughly 3 degrees F.

1.5 degrees C is 2.7 degrees F - the only thing you missed is that this is a difference, not an absolute temperature. Suppose C to F is 1.8*c+32=f. Take two values for c, x and y. Then:

(1.8x+32)-(1.8y+32)=1.8(x-y)

I think you need a better calculator.

To elaborate a bit, your calculation is wrong because 0°F is not 0°C. That makes arithmetic really weird when mixing units. 0°C is 32°F, so 34.7°F is actually only 2.7°F more.

I think this is the only common case of units using a different zero point.

That's not how the math works...you seem to have done a temperature conversion and ignore that Celsius and Fahrenheit place their O's at different places

+1.5 degrees C is about +3 degrees F but 0 degrees C is 32 degrees F.

Well, the google calculator says it's: (1.5°C × 9/5) + 32 = 34.7°F

Are you trolling?

If not: We are not talking of the temperature 1.5°C. We are talking about a temperature difference of 1.5°C.

You're confusing the two interpretations of "1.5°C". The calculation you're using is interpreting it as the absolute temperature, relative to Celsius zero (which is not the same as Fahrenheit zero!).

What you actually want to do is find how much Fahrenheit _delta_ is equivalent to a 1.5C delta. Try calculating the Fahrenheit value for 20C, and then for 21.5C, and then subtract.

Or you can look at the equation you're using, where the slope is a clear and constant 9/5. 9/5*1.5 = 2.7

You're getting a lot of downvotes, but this is legitimately the first time I realized that a 1.5C temperature difference really means a 5 degree difference in Fahrenheit. I think it would genuinely help Americans if this were reported in the scale we were familiar with. A 5 degree F difference sounds far, far more scary than a 2.5 degree C difference.

Or maybe it's time Americans start educating themselves on matters that pretty much everyone else in the world understands but them.

What do you think is more efficient? Some how convincing all Americans to learn the metric system to the point that they can intuit differences in temperature, or, explain it in a way they can understand it by simply using a different unit of measurement?

I mean, I agree with you, but trying to get the entirety of a country to educate themselves in time to do something about it is not really going to work.

Well, it really does say something about our hopes of doing something about it if we can't even get them to learn to multiply a number by 2 and add 30 (see, I'm being generous and rounding the numbers). Hell, let's make it even simpler. Just say "IN FAHRENHEIT IT'S MORE, WAY MORE."

Maybe if we call them "dollar degrees" and "euro degrees" we'll get their attention.

But seriously now, yes, I do think it would be a pretty good idea for Americans to learn the metric system and not just because of the issue at hand, and it shouldn't be that hard. Isn't it intuitive enough to remember "0 is for freezing and 100 is for boiling water"?

1.5C = 2.7F. It's a large amount to change by when you're talking about global average temperature.

That's not how this works at all.

Now subtract 32 F and you get 2.7 F which is the delta.

An outside temperature of 1.5c is 34.7f. an increase of 1.5c would take the temperature to 3c or 37.4f

Every 1c you increase is equivalent to 1.8f

Pretty sure how this works is if the global ave temp is 12.5C, then the temp they are talking about would be 14.0C.

Pretty sure it's closer to +2.7°F since the conversion factor is 9/5

A change of 1.5C is about 2.7F.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celsius

Edit to add: I think I and sibling commenters have been trolled :-)

I think your math is off. 20 F + 1.5 C = ~23 F

I don't see why this is downvoted. It's a sincere and humourous mistake

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