54C Recorded In Kuwait Likely Hottest On Record In Asia (foxnews.com) 355
An anonymous reader writes from an Associated Press report: The UN weather agency said it suspects that the 54C temperature recorded in Kuwait has set a record for the eastern hemisphere. The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said Tuesday it is setting up a committee to look into whether the temperature recorded last Thursday in Mitrabah, Kuwait, was a new high for the eastern hemisphere and in Asia. WMO's Omar Baddour said it is "likely" to be an eastern hemisphere record. Last week, swathes of the Middle East and North Africa and were hit by heatwaves that have become more frequent over the last half-century, and Earth is fresh off the hottest six months on record. WMO says the world record high of 56.7C was recorded at Furnace Creek in Death Valley, California, in 1913. In the UAE, highs of 49C are expected inland on Wednesday. Last year, the mercury rose above 50C in Sweiham, near Al Ain.An article on Citylab, citing NOAA's latest analysis notes that it was the warmest June in the modern history and also the 14th consecutive month of unprecedented hotness.
That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Informative)
That's 129.2F if you're interested.
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
A dry 129.2F isn't a problem if you have water. Our biology is built with cooling systems that work very well in this scenario.
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Funny)
A dry 129.2F isn't a problem if you have water. Our biology is built with cooling systems that work very well in this scenario.
The only cooling system I want at that temperature is air-conditioning!
Re: (Score:3)
I am wondering at which temperature the AC stops working.
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Kerry says AC is worse than ISIS.
You are a terrorist, apparently.
Well I'm terrified so yeah.
This conversation does not make me feel safe!!!!11111oneoneone
Re: (Score:2)
Kerry says AC is worse than ISIS.
If John Kerry is so worried about AC, there's always this: Remove air conditioning from all US State Department property. [change.org] I'm tempted to sign it, but don't want to be added to the enemies list when Clinton/Trump gets elected.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Kerry says AC is worse than ISIS.
You are a terrorist, apparently.
Kerry is an asshat and not to be taken seriously. Why do you Americans keep on voting is morons from the Democratic party? They have no clue what they are doing.
Because they like them better than the morons from the Republican party.
Re: That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
It's still pretty fucking hot though.
Thanks for all the oil, here is the leftovers..... (Score:2)
it's incredible how much better some of my cousins can handle the heat better than I can. That wasn't the case when I lived there. I remember reading about it taking a few weeks for your blood to become thinner and more capillaries to grow in your skin which helps you cool off.
I am so very glad to hear that the people over there have the infrastructure and acclimation to handle it so well. They won't mind then if I crank up the thermostat another 10 degrees Fahrenheit, because it can get a little chilly
Re: (Score:3)
Except of course if you happen to be very young and unable to regulate your body temperature as efficiently as a fit adult...
Oh and if you're very old...because same....and if you're pregnant..and well I think it's obvious such heat is dangerous.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
At this temperature that would be quite useless, considering your body would have taken care of that LONG before it hits the 54 degree.
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Because water was practically pouring on them as he said it. Steamy, humid heat feels hotter than low humidity heat.
Re: (Score:2)
Shut up, Hudson!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Any heat is dry once it causes your blood to boil off.
Re: (Score:2)
But it's dry heat.
Knock it off, Hudson!
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Meanwhile, conservative America still has its head up its ass insisting that climate change is a liberal conspiracy and evolution the thing of the devil.
Now there's something Saudi Arabia and the US have in common. Love for oil, religious nutjobs and ignorance towards scientific evidence.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Meanwhile, conservative America still has its head up its ass insisting that climate change is a liberal conspiracy and evolution the thing of the devil.
Not here to refute climate change, just to point out that this particular data point doesn't necessarily support it. The fact that the record in the western hemisphere was set in 1913 and has yet to be exceeded suggests that record temperatures are just, you know, kinda rare.
Re: (Score:2)
Saying that an extreme cold temperature is evidence that there's no climate change going on is like saying "how can there be a tsunami coming? there's no water at all on the beach!!"
With extreme highs can come extreme lows.. the whole system is going out of whack. But the overall trend is steadily upwards.
Re: (Score:3)
"But the overall trend is steadily upwards."
Since, like 10,000 years ago,.
Since like not 10,000 years ago. The warming coming out of the last glaciation (ice age) started ~25,000 years ago and reached a peak during the Holocene Climatic Optimum [wikipedia.org] about 8,000 years ago. The temperature trend since then has been slightly downward as would be expected from an analysis of Milankovitch Cycles. It's only in the last ~100 years that a new upward trend got started due to the increase in greenhouse gases (mostly CO2) in the atmosphere.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not basing my post on the "single data point", but on these:
were hit by heatwaves that have become more frequent over the last half-century
Earth is fresh off the hottest six months on record
the warmest June in the modern history and also the 14th consecutive month of unprecedented hotness
Gee, did you not even read the freaking summary?
Re: (Score:3)
Even the Earth having the hottest six months on record or the 14th consecutive month of unprecedented hotness is not particularly meaningful in the context of climate. It could be just a statistical fluke. But when you plot the trend of El Nino temperature trends over the last 50 years you find a steadily increasing temperature for El Ninos (as well as La Ninas and ENSO neutral years) which is meaningful in the context of climate.
Here's the graph. [skepticalscience.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Reported on 129.2FM? All I get is static -why is that modded Informative?!
Re: (Score:2)
That's 129.2F if you're interested.
Or 327.15 K if you care.
Re: (Score:2)
Or 588.9 R if you like show horses.
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Informative)
I hope you realize that 129.2F means absolutely nothing to the majority of the world. ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I always wondered how everyone understood measurements given by the UK show Top Gear when they talk about miles, miles per hour and horsepower. Not to mention pints.
Yeah they call a large glass of beer 'a pint' but its not literally a pint of liquid, its just a euphemism. If you empty your glass and get a measuring jug, fill it to 1 pint of water then pour it into the glass it'll overflow. I've done this.
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Interesting)
I always wondered how everyone understood measurements given by the UK show Top Gear when they talk about miles, miles per hour and horsepower. Not to mention pints.
Well, basically it's a complete myth that everywhere but the U.S. converted to metric in everyday life. The UK has "officially" been using metric for 50 years, but imperial units are EVERYWHERE in common circumstances if you bother to look for them. (For a full explanation, you might look at this report [ukma.org.uk] from the UK Metric Association which seeks to promote literacy in metric.
There are obvious situations from everyday life where UK folks still use imperial units -- most prefer "stone" (or "pounds/ounces" for babies) for human weight, for example. But other units crop up all the time. Celsius is standard for weather forecasts, except when it gets really hot, in which case broadcasters love to point out it might get to "100 degrees!" Watts are the SI unit, but you get engines measured in HP and heating systems measured in BTUs. Clothing sizes are still commonly in inches. Road signs still commonly give distances in miles (or yards, for shorter distances and feet and inches for height restrictions). Paper is mostly metric, but photos are still standard 4"x6". Refrigerators are often still sold with volume given in cu. ft. House/apartment sizes are often still described by agents in sq. ft. Small grocers often still advertise in imperial units of weight or volume.
Etc., etc. There are also plenty of cases where more obscure units are still used in various skilled trades.
Most countries that claim to be "fully metric" have similar issues. This list [bwmaonline.com] is a bit old, but it shows how old non-metric units continue to be used in random places throughout Europe, even in countries that "converted" more than a century ago.
After reading a lot about this, my conclusion was that the most successful countries that really made a break with older measures did so by simply redefining their older units. Hence, the French still order a "pound loaf" of bread, but it's actually 500 grams -- they simply redefined the livre (pound) in the 1800s to be exactly half a kilo. Given the way that all the old imperial units have now been so precisely defined, it's no longer really feasible to do that anymore.
So most countries are stuck with weird hybrids, where officially everyone is supposed to use metric, but you get old units cropping up in all sorts of everyday places where they are useful.
I'm a big fan of the metric system and wish that everyone would adopt a standard measurement system -- but these residual units in most countries go to show how little utility the supposed "simplicity" of the metric system actually has for everyday life. People have a sense of how big a "X cu. ft." refrigerator is, and they can use it to compare when they buy a new one. The average person never really cares about the conversion of that unit to anything else -- they don't care that there are 1728 cu. in. in a cu. ft. and they'll basically never need to know that or do such a conversion. They just want to know how big their refrigerator is and how it compares to the new one they might buy. The units might as well be "7.2 standard refrigerator units" for all people care... and that's why these old units stick around. Very few circumstances demand conversion of units for everyday people in everyday life, so the "easiness" of the metric system means nothing to them. If they want to buy pants, they know the number that fits them -- it doesn't matter is it is centimeters or inches or cubits or furlongs.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't really care much about the rest of the world, as far as common every day things like watching the morning news for the weather to see the temperature, etc...and know how to dress, I have little to no contact with folks outside the US.
And since Slashdot is a US centric site...most things are (and should be) in the units of measurement we are all used to.
Re: (Score:2)
Enjoy your life in the data ghetto that is the USA. If you want to talk to anyone from the other 95.6% of the world then it's time to get that 8th grade education you should already have.
Re: (Score:3)
My mother spent most of my childhood while I was learning metric ranting against the metric system. She was absolutely convinced it was a plot to rip her off: that a gallon of milk would be rounded down to 3 liters and still cost as much, that a 5 pound bag of sugar would be rounded down to 2kg and cost as much, and so on.
The "shrink ray" effect of inflation proved that switching to metric was not necessary to rip everyone off, but I suspect that at the time, enough housewives felt the same as her that att
Re: (Score:2)
Not having the metric system here, has never affected my life, nor anyone I know really.
And for the most part, most Americans have no contact with anyone else in the world, there's really not much need for it as that the US is pretty vast and populated enough, with many diverse regions of temperament, terrain, etc.....
So, we don't really care about what your 95.6% of the world does or think
Re: (Score:3)
FTFY
Re: (Score:2)
If you don't care much about the rest of the world, why the fuck are you reading news about temperature in Kuwait in first place?
Re: (Score:2)
I'm browsing through the headlines on a US Centric website, and was somewhat questioning why US Centric units of measurement weren't being used, and saying I was appreciative that someone provide the translation before I had to...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I hope you realize that 129.2F means absolutely nothing to the majority of the world. ;)
And yet ironically the US dollar means absolutely everything to the majority of the financial world.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
100 is very close to average human body temperature of 98.6. If the temp is near 100 or above, you will have a harder time cooling off, especially if it's humid and you don't get cooling from your sweat evaporating. In Celcius it's 37 which is the 12th prime number, so you've got that going for you. /s.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
I hope you realize that no one gives a shit about Euro-centrism.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The actual funny thing is that your "2 digit positive number" has overflown into three digits for this story.
So hot it went over two digits. That actually makes it very obvious just how extremely hot it was.
Re: (Score:3)
That's why my thermostat reads out as a signed 8-bit integer. If it ever goes out of range (I don't live in or near Kuwait), I'm not going to be there to read it anyway.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I would venture to guess that hardly any American would know how to dress really at 7C or 70C...they are meaningless in every day use here in the US.
It depends on what you are used to and have grown up with....
I instantly know what to wear and the comfort zone of a day outside with the high at 76F. AT 76C I'd have no idea
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:4, Funny)
AT 76C I'd have no idea what to put on....
Don't worry, at 76C you will soon be dead. It won't matter what you are wearing.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
What does Fahrenheit relate to? Who knows?
0F is the temperature of a particular ice/brine mixture, and it was approximately the lowest temperature typically experienced in Fahrenheit's area. I suppose that one advantage of that is not having to use negative values very often.
100F is approximately human body temperature. That's pretty easy to relate to.
One nice property of the system is that 0F is often dangerously cold, and 100F is often dangerously hot.
Re: (Score:2)
Now, if by environmental temperatures, you mean a space faring people then Kelvin would be the way to go. 273K equals 0C and anything in the 290s is comfortable (60-80F), (16-27C)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:That's 129.2F if you're interested. (Score:5, Insightful)
One nice property of the system is that 0F is often dangerously cold, and 100F is often dangerously hot.
Surely that's more applicable to Celsius. 0C is the point at which water freezes most places, forming dangerous ice. It's also close to the point where you can start to experience severe health problems due to the cold if you don't take care.
100C is the boiling point of water. the point at which it starts to become steam that can burn you and at which contact can do severe, lasting damage to your skin. Well, okay, 80C+ is pretty bad too.
The other big advantages of the 0C and 100C points are that you can use water to calibrate your sensor reasonably well, by simply freezing or boiling it.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually the truly nice thing about Celsius is that it is just a form of measurement. People take to the form of measurement they grow up with. They equate things in ways that make sense to them. Celsius is no better than Fahrenheit in that regard (I'm waiting for the person who last time came out to say that the nice thing about Fahrenheit is that you change your cloths only on factors of 10 so you can wear the same cloths from 70F-79F)
I can draw comparisons to the length of a meter but not for yards. I ca
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not interested in the freezing/boiling point of water. I know that I freeze at 0F and boil at 100F.
Re: (Score:2)
(American isn't a language)
Ask someone from the UK about that some time.
Re: (Score:3)
The site is owned and operated by Americans, that makes it an American site, dipshit. Also, most people in the world speak more than one language, so language has SFA to do with country of origin except to rubes.
I'm sure the Americans how operate the site never had the intention to see their site considered as such. But hey, beat your chest in jingoistic bravado if it gets you into an e-raged filled patriotgasm.
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks....59C means absolutely nothing to me....I was about to have to go look this up on a google conversion....PITA.
'Murica! Fuck yeah! (roll eyes)
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks....59C means absolutely nothing to me....I was about to have to go look this up on a google conversion....PITA.
'Murica! Fuck yeah! (roll eyes)
Oh, I assumed he was from Belize.
Re: (Score:2)
"Halfway to water's boiling point" is colder than dry ice.
"Twice as hot as a hot day" is hot enough to melt lead.
"Three times as hot as a reasonably comfortable temperature" is hot enough to glow faintly red.
On the other hand, if you stubbornly refuse to learn about how temperature actually works, you could say "add up two days of that temperature and it's hot enough to boil water!"
Re: (Score:2)
I thought it was more like 130. The 54 gives you two significant digits, so if you round 129.2 to another number with two significant digits it goes to 130 F. Unless I'm missing something.
Overlooking a larger trend... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It's uninhabitable already.
There's quite a few cities and oil terminals that sit on the Persian Gulf. From what I read elsewhere, the daily temperatures will be so hot that people will just drop dead without an environmental suit.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
I said pilsner, not "Budweiser".
Bud would probably be better because its very close to water.
Re: (Score:2)
It's uninhabitable already.
because no beer.
Re: (Score:2)
Please by all means post your dire predictions, but shut up when you're wrong.
I stand corrected. The Persian Gulf will become uninhabitable at the end of this century.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/10/26/climate-change-could-soon-push-persian-gulf-temperatures-to-lethal-extremes-report-warns/ [washingtonpost.com]
Re: (Score:3)
Is that a bad thing?
Only for the Europeans when the climate refugees show up on their borders.
Why worry? (Score:2)
They have burkinis.
For now.... (Score:2)
So let me understand... (Score:3)
...in this case "weather" IS climate?
I'm never sure when it is, or when it isn't.
Because I don't recall it getting a lot of play when:
14 June 2016 -- In Vostok, temperature of -80.3 degrees was recorded.Coldest since observations began.
(http://iceagenow.info/record-cold-antarctica/)
Curious, isn't it?
Re: (Score:2)
Suppressed by mainstream media --
That's funny I swore that I first read about it in the Age, which talked about a 4 corners report. And now there are calls for a royal commission. That's one hell of a suppression.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You sold all the crude oil to the world. Now suffer the consequences of global warming.
They were selling, we didn't have to buy, so I think the responsibility rests more with those that bought and burned all that oil.
In related news, oil also comes from other areas of the Earth.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
You please shut up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
They've spent the last 20 years building artificial islands for rich people. They'll be fine.
The USA with its coastal cities? Not so much.
Re: (Score:3)
Causes aside, what would you call an increasing trend in temperatures if not global warming? Or did you think global warming suddenly meant all cold weather would disappear overnight?
Re: (Score:2)
No the problem is both deniers and "alarmists" can both pick temperature extremes in a given year but the global average continues stair stepping upwards likely resulting in ~4B people trying to migrate in the next century or so. But hey, the venn diagram of AGW deniers and friends of immigrants has a huge overlap right?
Re:You made the bed. Now sleep in it. (Score:5, Informative)
Record cold can be evidence for global warming. The key is to understand what "warming" actually is: adding energy to the system. Consider a glass of water. What happens when you add energy to it by shaking it? The answer is, it sloshes around -- the maximum height of the water surface gets higher, and the minimum height gets lower. Or consider the refrigeration thermodynamic cycle: one part of the system gets colder even though the total energy of the system is increasing.
That's not to say that record cold is always evidence of global warming, or indeed that it could never be evidence of an oncoming ice age. I'm just pointing out that the issue is more complicated than "record cold = cooling" or "record heat = heating" considered in isolation. We only know that record heat actually is evidence for heating because it's been observed as part of a larger pattern and was predicted by climate models and such (i.e., all the actual science that climatologists do that a Fox News sound bite is inadequate to explain).
Re: (Score:3)
Record cold can be evidence for global warming. The key is to understand what "warming" actually is: adding energy to the system. Consider a glass of water. What happens when you add energy to it by shaking it? The answer is, it sloshes around -- the maximum height of the water surface gets higher, and the minimum height gets lower. Or consider the refrigeration thermodynamic cycle: one part of the system gets colder even though the total energy of the system is increasing.
That's not to say that record cold is always evidence of global warming, or indeed that it could never be evidence of an oncoming ice age. I'm just pointing out that the issue is more complicated than "record cold = cooling" or "record heat = heating" considered in isolation. We only know that record heat actually is evidence for heating because it's been observed as part of a larger pattern and was predicted by climate models and such (i.e., all the actual science that climatologists do that a Fox News sound bite is inadequate to explain).
indeed. for an analogy; high summer temperatures in my house are correlated with very low temperatures; directly in front of my air conditioner.
in a vaguely analogous way, the shut down of the Gulf Stream observed with increased oceanic warming is going to lead to colder winters for Europe, most of which is north of NYC.
and, weirdly enough, to increased rate of sea level rise on the US east coast, since the old Gulf Stream was powerful enough to actually lower the water level there.
Re: (Score:3)
I don't think anyone serious is pointing to this as proof of climate change though. At most they might claim it is a symptom of it. It's an important distinction, because one side is saying "this is likely to be the result of climate change" and the other is saying "this one event proves that climate change isn't happening".
Re: (Score:3)
If all it takes for you to disregard the massive body of evidence behind AGW is someone saying something you don't like, you are terrible at this. I bet your post sounded awesome in your head, but on the screen it is laughably naive.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
No, we don't wonder. We just shrug and say, "another FOX news listener".
Re:You made the bed. Now sleep in it. (Score:5, Insightful)
And people wonder why we don't believe Global Warming.
I don't wonder. I see it as one of the human brain's greatest weaknesses. More and more research shows that once people pick a side, they are highly likely to dig in and contrary evidence actually reinforces their incorrect position. Perhaps this served some evolutionary purpose (you only need to learn fire is hot once) but in today's world where humans have the capability to drastically alter the environment we need to listen to the fucking facts.
Lead is bad for the brain even if the lead industry spends 50 years and $millions trying to prove otherwise. Smoking causes cancer even if the cigarette industry spends 50 years and $millions trying to prove otherwise. The average global temperature is rising due to human emissions of a known greenhouse gas into the atmosphere at a rate that does indeed match most models even if the fossil fuel industry spends 50 years and $millions trying to prove otherwise. Not exactly sure what industry is against vaccinations (maybe religion) but apparently you might not even need a shadowy group to cause trouble (see recent measles outbreaks).
For an especially hilarious example, see the John Oliver clip where newt ginrich repeatedly basically says "my feelings are more important than your facts for making policy". If humanity as a whole can evolve past that bullshit maybe we have a shot at colonizing space...or at least finding out if the physics of the universe allow it. If not, then I guess we don't deserve to and we'll get wiped out and the earth will try again in a few hundred million years.
Anyway, hopefully the deniers are right cause if not, we're fucked.
Re: (Score:3)
I don't wonder. I see it as one of the human brain's greatest weaknesses. More and more research shows that once people pick a side, they are highly likely to dig in and contrary evidence actually reinforces their incorrect position. Perhaps this served some evolutionary purpose (you only need to learn fire is hot once)
Probably more local diversity so we don't get wiped out by spurious reasoning, mono-culture or get stuck on some local maximum. Instead of risking the whole tribe jumping on what they think is a good thing we'll divide into camps with the old ways and the new ways like a primitive scientific experiment. Today we don't have that strong evolutionary pressure but back when people would starve and freeze and die from all sorts of injuries and diseases I imagine this could be rather important in a shifting envir
Re: (Score:2)
Name calling, the last bastion of people who can't make an intelligent argument. And AC to boot. Color me surprised.
Re: (Score:2)
I had no idea that Uber was a "high tech" company.
A fantastic service and good idea? Sure. High tech? Not so much.
Re: (Score:2)
We are becoming acclimatized to colonizing Venus, the Space Nutters will be pleased. Next step, breathing CO2 at 90 times Earth pressure.
Wanna move to Venus? Cloud cities!
Re: (Score:3)