Just spend a couple of weeks without it, you’ll be fine and come out the other side much more tolerant of heat.
This is the case of most “I can’t imagine” situations, just do it for a bit and your fear will prove mostly unfounded.
This is the case of most “I can’t imagine” situations, just do it for a bit and your fear will prove mostly unfounded.
I'm relatively far north in the USA, but even where I am, I found the 85F+ heat waves unbearable for WFH and sleep. I grew up without AC and grew to hate summers as a result. This summer I discovered that I just do not function intellectually above 80F indoors.
It's a bit different if you're outside with a breeze, enjoying nature, hiking, walking, biking, etc. I seem perfectly capable of reading a book or having a stimulating chat in those situations. But even with a fan going, there's a pretty low temperature ceiling for me where I can't work productively. And if it doesn't get below 70F at night, I can't sleep well, which has even more impact on my happiness and productivity.
So I can survive without AC. But I broke and got an AC unit a couple of weeks ago. This heat wave for the past week or so in the northeast convinced me that I was right to do so. I'm just not happy without it.
It's not "nobody needs AC", but the "oh my god I can't live without AC" is mostly fear. If you push yourself into situations where you're uncomfortably hot/code for a while, you'll find your dependance lessened. That's all.
I'm quite happy with my well-air-conditioned apartment, I have no problem with using it, and it's helpful. But I'm also fine with being outside the perfect temperature bubble sometimes.
A trick that can help with that is have "cold rooms" and let the other rooms raise in temperature.
I'm very comfortable above 80° if I haven't been moving around a bunch, but after I come in from outside work I like a cool room for awhile.
[1] https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/2020-traffic-crash-data...
Ah, do you have evidence that >65s weren't dying because of heat stress for those thousands of years? That'd be cheering.
Deciding the excess heat often now caused by climate change should be allowed to kill large numbers of the elderly when AC can prevent it is quite a take. I certainly hope everyone holding such a belief does so because they have already eliminated all sources of emissions in their life that are not literally life and death.
I think you and I agree that for e.g. a young healthy person it's bad and wasteful to keep the same temperature control. However, the comment to which I responded doesn't have the disclaimers you've added; it contributes to a "people should be able to tough it out" narrative that we shouldn't perpetuate when in reality, people are dying unnecessarily.
Something like one out of ten people around the world is over 65. In the US, something like one out of four. That's a huge chunk of humanity, not a corner case to handwave.
Not being an overweight and sedentary young person exaggerating the suffering of being in an 80 degree room.
Citation needed.
If only ~2 in a million die of heat or heat contributed causes per year, either people without air conditioning are incredibly rare (they’re not) or there have to be fairly extreme circumstances to risk death.
Do you really need more evidence or are you just being obtuse? Do you actually think healthy or even most unhealthy adults are risking death without AC in any but the most extreme circumstances?
If anyone else has clicked into the thread for whatever reason and wants to learn, here are resources I'd recommend. US-centric, sorry.
* https://health2016.globalchange.gov/low/ClimateHealth2016_02... - connects with climate change projections, talks a bit about how even sub-"extreme" heat conditions can lead to health issues
* https://www.cdc.gov/nceh/tracking/topics/Heat.htm - pretty cool data resources
* https://www.cdc.gov/climateandhealth/docs/UseOfCoolingCenter... - esp. in places like AZ where the need is really really clear, "cooling centers" are becoming a thing.
* https://www.nationalpartnership.org/our-work/resources/healt... - Heat and pregnancy go together really badly. This piece is kind of lobbying, so less reputable than the CDC stuff, but aggregates some pretty eye-popping statistics; citations on page 5.
* https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/EHP6221 - preterm births, low birth weights, heart defects – bleak stuff.
* https://www.acf.hhs.gov/ocs/policy-guidance/liheap-im-2022-0... - the programs that used to mainly just help low-income households afford energy bills are being directed to help afford AC equipment/installation as well. If you know someone who needs this help, start at https://liheapch.acf.hhs.gov/search-tool/
* https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/heatstress/acclima.html - NIOSH has some useful recommendations about how to acclimatize to heat safely. ("acclimatize" being the individual body ramping up its ability to deal with heat – interestingly, when people in this field use the word "adapt", increasing AC penetration is one of the things that goes into that)