Title: Re: [USMA:33760] Re: BOILING, FREEZING AND THE FAHRENHEIT THERMOMETER
Dear Jim,
Thanks for your additions to the temperature discussion.
I have interspersed some remarks and asked some questions.
on 2005-07-30 07.47, James R. Frysinger at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Thanks for that nice bit of thermometer history, Nat. Quite interesting!
>
> You mentioned two temperatures, in passing, regarding the Celsius temperature
> scale. Of course, we realize that those are not the definition points for the
> Celsius scale today and have not been for quite some time.
Do you have an approximate date for the change from 0 °C to 0.01 °C?
> Today we use,
> effectively, 0.01 °C (triple point of water) and -273.15 °C ("absolute zero"
> in common parlance).
And where does this leave the boiling point of water? Is it still exactly at 100 °C?
> Here's another interesting bit. The original scale used by Celsius put the 100
> at the melting temperature of freshly fallen snow and the 0 at the boiling
> point of water on a "fair" day. Why? I don't know.
I will ignore the inversion of the temperature scale as I don't understand this either and I will confine my remarks to the word, 'Fair'.
My take on this is that the barometer was invented before the thermometer and that from quite early times words such as 'Stormy', 'Rainy', and 'Fair' were added to the scales and dials of such devices (especially aneroid barometers) before numerical pressure units were fully developed. These days barometers are often labelled with the old word descriptions, the old pre-metric inch measures, and the SI unit, hectopascals, although these are often described as millibars. On the barometer that I have in my office the label 'Fair' seems to apply to a range between 1015 and 1030 hectopascals. Could this be the 'Fair' day to which Fahrenheit was referring when he boiled his water?
> I use a picture of his
> original thermometer in my classes and I've posted it here before.
I cannot recall having seen this picture. Could you post it again, please?
Cheers,
Pat Naughtin ASM (NSAA), LCAMS (USMA)*
PO Box 305, Belmont, Geelong, Australia
Phone 61 3 5241 2008
Pat Naughtin is the editor of the free online monthly newsletter, 'Metrication matters'.
You can subscribe by going to http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter
* Pat is the editor of the 'Numbers and measurement' chapter of the Australian Government Publishing Service 'Style manual – for writers, editors and printers', he is an Accredited Speaking Member (ASM) with the National Speakers Association of Australia, and a Lifetime Certified Advanced Metrication Specialist (LCAMS) with the United States Metric Association. For more information go to: http://metricationmatters.com
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- [USMA:33826] Re: BOILING, FREEZING AND THE FAHRENHEIT THERMO... Pat Naughtin
