 |
|
“The ‘heat index’ measures how stupid you are.”
Posted on: August 16, 2023 at 15:57:50 CT
Spanky KU
Posts:
138011
Member For:
19.82 yrs
Level:
User
M.O.B. Votes:
2
https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/the-heat-index-misinforms-readers/ar-AA1fm27n?ocid=hpmsn&cvid=3110271df5954e4a852232817b05cc85&ei=31
Something called the “heat index” is becoming commonplace, even the norm, in news reports.
“Why the heat index matters more than the temperature in a heat wave,” went a CNN headline in July. Also in July, the New York Times issued an explainer to interpret the new scale and terminology that replaced plain old temperature: “What Is the Heat Index, and Why Does It Matter?” Now, temperature is out, and, “experts say, it’s the heat index that should draw more concern.” Last week, the Washington Post ran the headline “Hot-tub-like Persian Gulf fuels 158-degree heat index in Iran.”
Temperature itself is a complicated thing. To get boring and scientific about it, temperature measures the average kinetic energy of teeny molecules, which, even in a solid substance, are still moving about at the subatomic level. But, of course, there are different ways to measure it. Americans tend to use Fahrenheit, everyone else around the world tends to use Celsius, and scientists tend to use Kelvin, which sets zero to “absolute zero,” a physical constant that refers to the point when those molecules aren’t moving. But the main thing we actually do with temperature is wonder what it’s like outside. And for that purpose, we’re getting some strange new scales recently.
Much like “wind chill” is a bad thing to include in winter weather reports, “heat index” is a misleading measure that isn’t related to our intuitions of how hot it is outside. Strictly speaking, the “heat index” is not new. Writer Tom Scocca (whose work I recommend in general) wrote about it at Gawker in 2013, back before making fun of the weather reports was something that would get liberal bloggers called right-wing climate deniers, in a post called “The ‘heat index’ measures how stupid you are.”
As it factors in humidity and direct sunlight, the heat index regularly produces numbers that sound crazily high, but only because readers are comparing them to the straight temperature, non-heat index figures they’re used to. Put it this way: At 96 degrees Fahrenheit and 65% humidity, a weather combination that sucks but is something any resident of Washington, D.C., also calls “a summer day,” the “heat index” is a searing-sounding 121 degrees. Washington summer is hot, and it must have been hard for the government to function for the 102 years between the 1790 Residence Act and the invention of air conditioning by Willis Haviland Carrier in 1902. But the district is also not Death Valley.
Still, the misleading “heat index” has cousins. On July 20, Britain’s the Independent reported that “land surface temperatures had surpassed 60C” as part of what was dubbed Europe’s “Cerberus” heat wave. The temperature of the ground, of course, matters for crops and dried-out soil that primes conditions for wildfires, and it’s useful to track it as meteorological scientists do by satellite. But a news headline like this gives the odd impression that it’s 140 degrees Fahrenheit out when it is not.
Then, there’s “wet bulb temperature,” which is a proxy for how hot a sweaty human body will feel at certain wind and heat conditions, measured in theory by putting a wet cloth over the bulb of a thermometer. “Wet bulb” is also a term that Google Trends shows with roughly 10 times more interest this summer than five summers ago. What happened? Is it because the world is warming?
The combined ocean and land temperature has been increasing at an average of .32 degrees Fahrenheit per decade since 1981, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. In the United States and Europe, it may be higher than that average, and extreme heat days stand out. Still, the reason news reports 30 years ago avoided “heat index,” “land surface temperature,” and “wet bulb temperature” is not that it’s slightly hotter now and on track to continue warming. It’s that reporters today have a drive to narrativize about the dangers of dangerous and unpleasant weather conditions, even when it’s actively giving readers a false or confused impression. You can glean this because, climate change being an overall trend toward warming, news and weather reports stress the framing of concern about “wet bulb” temperatures despite the fact that peer-reviewed institutional findings from science journals (for example, this study in Lancet Planetary Health) show that cold weather causes many times more deaths than hot weather.
The heat index, land surface temperature, and wet bulb temperature measure real (if odd) things. And a trend of average warming from anthropogenic climate change is a real thing. But journalistic outlets that use them in a way that can be confused with the regular old temperature are trying to mislead you into fearing a level of current personal danger that is not real.
Something called the “heat index” is becoming commonplace, even the norm, in news reports.
“Why the heat index matters more than the temperature in a heat wave,” went a CNN headline in July. Also in July, the New York Times issued an explainer to interpret the new scale and terminology that replaced plain old temperature: “What Is the Heat Index, and Why Does It Matter?” Now, temperature is out, and, “experts say, it’s the heat index that should draw more concern.” Last week, the Washington Post ran the headline “Hot-tub-like Persian Gulf fuels 158-degree heat index in Iran.”
Temperature itself is a complicated thing. To get boring and scientific about it, temperature measures the average kinetic energy of teeny molecules, which, even in a solid substance, are still moving about at the subatomic level. But, of course, there are different ways to measure it. Americans tend to use Fahrenheit, everyone else around the world tends to use Celsius, and scientists tend to use Kelvin, which sets zero to “absolute zero,” a physical constant that refers to the point when those molecules aren’t moving. But the main thing we actually do with temperature is wonder what it’s like outside. And for that purpose, we’re getting some strange new scales recently.
Much like “wind chill” is a bad thing to include in winter weather reports, “heat index” is a misleading measure that isn’t related to our intuitions of how hot it is outside. Strictly speaking, the “heat index” is not new. Writer Tom Scocca (whose work I recommend in general) wrote about it at Gawker in 2013, back before making fun of the weather reports was something that would get liberal bloggers called right-wing climate deniers, in a post called “The ‘heat index’ measures how stupid you are.”
As it factors in humidity and direct sunlight, the heat index regularly produces numbers that sound crazily high, but only because readers are comparing them to the straight temperature, non-heat index figures they’re used to. Put it this way: At 96 degrees Fahrenheit and 65% humidity, a weather combination that sucks but is something any resident of Washington, D.C., also calls “a summer day,” the “heat index” is a searing-sounding 121 degrees. Washington summer is hot, and it must have been hard for the government to function for the 102 years between the 1790 Residence Act and the invention of air conditioning by Willis Haviland Carrier in 1902. But the district is also not Death Valley.
Still, the misleading “heat index” has cousins. On July 20, Britain’s the Independent reported that “land surface temperatures had surpassed 60C” as part of what was dubbed Europe’s “Cerberus” heat wave. The temperature of the ground, of course, matters for crops and dried-out soil that primes conditions for wildfires, and it’s useful to track it as meteorological scientists do by satellite. But a news headline like this gives the odd impression that it’s 140 degrees Fahrenheit out when it is not.
Then, there’s “wet bulb temperature,” which is a proxy for how hot a sweaty human body will feel at certain wind and heat conditions, measured in theory by putting a wet cloth over the bulb of a thermometer. “Wet bulb” is also a term that Google Trends shows with roughly 10 times more interest this summer than five summers ago. What happened? Is it because the world is warming?
The combined ocean and land temperature has been increasing at an average of .32 degrees Fahrenheit per decade since 1981, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. In the United States and Europe, it may be higher than that average, and extreme heat days stand out. Still, the reason news reports 30 years ago avoided “heat index,” “land surface temperature,” and “wet bulb temperature” is not that it’s slightly hotter now and on track to continue warming. It’s that reporters today have a drive to narrativize about the dangers of dangerous and unpleasant weather conditions, even when it’s actively giving readers a false or confused impression. You can glean this because, climate change being an overall trend toward warming, news and weather reports stress the framing of concern about “wet bulb” temperatures despite the fact that peer-reviewed institutional findings from science journals (for example, this study in Lancet Planetary Health) show that cold weather causes many times more deaths than hot weather.
The heat index, land surface temperature, and wet bulb temperature measure real (if odd) things. And a trend of average warming from anthropogenic climate change is a real thing. But journalistic outlets that use them in a way that can be confused with the regular old temperature are trying to mislead you into fearing a level of current personal danger that is not real.
Please explain why this message is being reported.
MESSAGE THREAD
“The ‘heat index’ measures how stupid you are.” - Spanky KU - 8/16 15:57:50