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TerpBE t1_iwonfnk wrote

"Twice as hot as lava" is both untrue (it's often over 2,000 F) and meaningless if you're using an arbitrary temperature scale like Fahrenheit or Celsius. Is 2 degrees Fahrenheit "twice as hot" as 1 degree Fahrenheit? What about 256K vs 256.5K?

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falcobird14 t1_iwonvv4 wrote

Assume the people who wrote the news article are stupid and science illiterate as the default.

Point is, it was apparently really fucking hot

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confusedtophers t1_iwoq7w0 wrote

I think it’s kind of like how a large sinkhole can be up to 15 refrigerators wide.

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money_sandwich t1_iwqai9c wrote

>15 refrigerators wide.

How much is that in football fields?

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Rezol t1_iwpgcd1 wrote

Any scale works as long as the "twice" actually refers to absolute temperature (i.e. Kelvin). Or maybe it should refer to its enthalpy? In any case we the reader understand that it's bloody hot, and for me it was specifically the "twice as hot as lava" that made it comical.

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hardcore-cpp-hater t1_iwp56eb wrote

I don't know about the first point but who says we're using an arbitrary temperature scale? By twice as hot they clearly intend to mean a temperature perceived to be twice as hot as lava. That part was just pedantic.

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-----_------__----- t1_iwpeg5k wrote

I doubt somebody would perceive it as twice as hot. At some point it isn't perceived as more hot anymore. Maybe we need to do some test with people who experienced both.

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hardcore-cpp-hater t1_iwpl571 wrote

That's correct, after a certain point (a relatively small number) we're unable to perceive that high. What I should've said was, they're saying the" average kinetic energy" is double that of lava - in other words what I'm really just trying to say is bringing up units was literally filler for that comment, it was an irrelevant addition, while correct nonetheless.

Edit: when you say something is hotter than something else without even mentioning units, you're not saying it's x Kelvin or x Celsius hotter ... you're just saying that it's hotter.

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