Talk: Celsius
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My research indicates that the original name centigrade came about because there were 100 graduations (steps) between the freezing and boiling points of water, and that the name was changed to Celsius less from a desire to recognise the man himself but more a desire to end confusion caused by:
- the metric use of centi as a prefix for 1/100th (which would seem to indicate, incorrectly, that a centigrade is 1/100th of a "grade"). (Centigrade pre-dates metric by over 50 years.)
- a whole bunch of European languages having their word for degree be similar to "grade"
Don't have conclusive evidence yet though.
Also, NIST and other standards bodies around the world seem to agree that Celsius should always be capitalized when spelt out.
I do not follow why 'centigrade' is confusing. A degree Celsius is 1/100 of a 'grade' between 0 and 100 degrees. Could someone explain this more clearly?
- If you say "The temperature is 25 centigrade." and your language's word for "degree" sounds a whole lot like "grade", then somebody (that knows the metric system better than the Celsius temperature scale) might interpret this as «The temperature is 25 hundredths of a degree.», which is not what you meant! -- Toby Bartels 11:59 1 Jun 2003 (UTC)
Also, I believe that renaming physical quantities to honor a person, such as 'cycles per second' to 'Hertz', is to me an imposition of human ego on the perfection of the Universe. David 21:10 Apr 27, 2003 (UTC)
- I disagree, but it any case it was renamed Celsius and that is its name, and what it is called worldwide. ÉÍREman 23:48 Apr 27, 2003 (UTC)
- I prefer to say 100 megahertz than 100 megacycle by second. Not you? -- Looxix 00:22 Apr 28, 2003 (UTC)
No one has ever said '100 megacycle by second'. The correct usage was '100 megacycles'. (The 'per second' was implied.)
We only prefer "Megahertz" now to "megacycles" because we have become used to it. That is how language naturally changes, through common usage. That does not make one term better than another. "Megacycles" is better than "Megahertz", in my opinion, because it is more descriptive of the physics involved. David 16:30 Apr 29, 2003 (UTC)
Yes, the USA, and Jamaica, apparently, are the last holdout for Fahrenheit for everyday, non-scientific temperature measurement, but Wikipedia editors should not parlay their annoyance at this situation into non-NPOV prose. As of today, I've toned down the text in this article and in the Fahrenheit article so that it reads less like commentary. There is no need to mention that Europeans find it "puzzling" that the USA is one of a "declining number of countries" "still" using this system, phrases which together imply fault. - mjb 00:47, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Wikipedia could really use a way to let the reader see their own preferred units. Since .org is a USA domain... yup, we like our Fahrenheit. The same goes for any other unit. So how about some Wiki syntax that lets the editor use units they prefer, while not annoying the reader? Otherwise I propose to fix all this senseless Celsius stuff. :-)
Spelling: Celsius vs Celcius
Can someone explain the origin of the alternate spelling?
I note that the Oxford English dictionary now uses "Celsius", as do Americans and the man's name is "Celsius."
However, it was always "Celcius" when I was at school and University. I've checked with others and they recall being taught the alternate spelling. Perhaps "Celcius" is a better phonetic spelling for an english speaker?
- Intriguing; never ran across that mistake(?) before myself. There are a lot of hits when you Google on it, too. Nothing in the Britannica or my other reference works. Must be another case of bloody American spelling. :-)
- Urhixidur 13:57, 2004 Nov 18 (UTC)
Concrete examples
Request: It would be nice to see a section (or maybe a table) with real-world examples. For instance:
-5 Freezer 0 Freezing point of water 5 Fridge 20 Room temperature 30 Temperate climate 100 Boiling point of water
(I have no idea if the examples I've used have any validity at all) Zik-Zak 13:37, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Original freezing and boiling points
According to some sources (such as http://susning.nu/Celsius for the fortunate few who read Swedish) Anders Celsius first defined 100 degrees as the temperature at which water freezes and zero degrees as the temperature at which water boils (the advantage of this, I suppose, being that outdoor temperatures would always be in the positive range). Before the scale became used to any measurable extent, however, this was changed to what we're used to today.
If this is true, it should perhaps be noted in the article.
- See the third paragraph. Note that the Delisle scale also runs "downward".
- Urhixidur 13:46, 2004 Nov 18 (UTC)
