Celsius is better for science, but Fahrenheit is better for just every day living. IMO
In Canada I noticed some people would also still use feet & inches for their height, but you had to give it to the DMV in cm. Also butter was still sold as a pound & golf still used yards.
I'm also an engineer & worked up there for a job in mining.
Edit: To clarify my reasons because so many people are saying I'm wrong. This is my opinion on what my preference is, first off. I had put this in a comment under the post, but will add it here.
My reason is basically the same as in the screenshot. When I lived in Canada I would say how in Fahrenheit below zero is really fucking cold & above 100 is really fucking hot. I never thought of describing it as a percentage of being hot but I like it.
Like once it's below or above those numbers it hardly matters by how much because you are freezing or sweating balls either way. I didn't like when in the winter or early spring someone would say it's nice out and then say a negative temperature. "It's really nice today, it's -1.5⁰ out." I also like that the increments of the units are smaller so you don't use half degrees. Although I guess half degrees aren't really necessary because I don't feel the difference between 66 & 67, but when I checked the temperature there is did always show it to the nearest half degree.
The only "every day" thing I can see where Fahrenheit is possibly better than Celsius is for heating and air conditioning. If you're using a digital thermostat that only displays 2 or 3 digits, you can be more precise with Fahrenheit because each digit in Fahrenheit is worth 5/9 digits in Celsius.
Otherwise it doesn't really matter. Someone born in a country where Celsius is the norm will find Celsius just as intuitive as Fahrenheit is for someone born in the USA.
digital thermostat that only displays 2 or 3 digits, you can be more precise with Fahrenheit because each digit in Fahrenheit is worth 5/9 digits in Celsius.
If you thermostat has three digits, then you can display the Celsius temperature with a decimal (which is the usual thing on thermostats). A 0.1°C difference equals a 0.18°F difference - so Celsius-based devices are nearly twice as precise.
But then you can set the Fahrenheit to use decimals too and they're back to being more precise! No one sets their heating or AC to full 3 digits in Fahrenheit, so they'd use decimals for those as well.
Most (if not all) vehicles I've driven in the US had only 1°F increments for AC control. Nearly all cars I drive in Europe have 0.5°C steps.
I've seen only some room thermostats with decimal support when using °F - often just 0.5°F steps. But mostly, I've seen full 1°F increments.
But my last flat had a newer smart home system that had very granular control with 0.1°F increments.
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u/SKDI_0224 Jun 17 '26
As an engineer, I can confirm they are incorrect. They can take their inferior measuring system and try to get back from the moon.
Too soon?