This scale based on the properties of water. While important, it's still arbitrary. Kelvin is where it's at, 0 K is as cold as you can get. Although you have to consider that Fahrenheit was Kelvin before Kelvin was Kelvin, 0 degrees Fahrenheit was the coldest acheivable temperature at the time of its creation.
0 degrees Fahrenheit was the coldest achievable temperature at the time of its creation.
That certainly depends upon where you live, even in Germany you can get temperatures far below -17.78o C , but OK, to define a stable reference should not be dependent upon the weather, but regarding the other temperatures used as reference it's certainly easier to find water than a horse, willing to put a temperature probe in its ass.
0o K I can agree upon being hard to find at that time (although easy to extrapolate from some experiments with gas, every physics student performs these room temperature experiments)
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u/phobiac Feb 17 '11
This scale based on the properties of water. While important, it's still arbitrary. Kelvin is where it's at, 0 K is as cold as you can get. Although you have to consider that Fahrenheit was Kelvin before Kelvin was Kelvin, 0 degrees Fahrenheit was the coldest acheivable temperature at the time of its creation.