Misconceptions About Temperature
Why Physics Stack Exchange recommends it
Physics Stack Exchange answerers point people to it when explaining why metal feels colder than air or fabric at the same temperature, since skin senses heat transfer rather than temperature.
Recommended by 2 people across 2 different months, 2014 to 2019.
What it is
A short Veritasium video, made for ABC TV Catalyst, that explains why our sense of hot and cold tracks the rate of heat flow rather than temperature itself. It uses demonstrations such as touching different materials at the same temperature to correct common misunderstandings.
What people said
Strong rec Cort Ammon · 2017-04 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “How can we feel temperature?”
The answer to "How do we feel temperature" is "you define temperature in a way that is different from how physicists define it." This video [this video] does an excellent job of showing the issue off. In science, temperature is defined to be a measure of the energy of highly disorganized motion of atoms in a material. In everything around you there is motion of this sort -- quite a lot of it in fact. You can't see it because its all disorganized. If one molecule in the key of your keyboard is vibrating towards you, its highly likely that the molecule next to it is vibrating away, so you don't notice the motion. However, everything is moving in this way. We observe that if you put two objects toge
Recommends Skyler · 2014-06 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “Why does cold metal seem colder than cold air?”
In essence heat transfer is what you're body is measuring. This video really hits the nail on the head of what you are wondering [this video] Our body senses heat flow from one source to a sink. When the rate of transfer is greater the object feels cooler/hotter. Objects acclimated to their room temperature will feel hotter or colder depending on the thermal conductivity. You can think of temperature as an absolute metric of sorts. The bigger the temperature difference the hotter or colder an object will feel. But, thermal conductivity serves as a multiplier if you will. A 70 degree object that is sucking the same flux of energy through your fingertips as a 30 degree object would have a higher th
Cites Jyotishraj Thoudam · 2017-04 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “How can we feel temperature?”
Recently I watched a Youtube Video by Veritasium [this video] He said we are actually feeling the rate of heat transfer, not the temperature. But how do we feel temperature? How is temperature different from heat and heat tranfer?
Cites BioPhysicist · 2019-02 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “New black Van in South Florida - To insulate or Not? Radiative Cooling effect?”
Is it my imagination that maybe the van getting super hot during the day and maybe something like Radiative cooling might be making my van cooler at night than if it had not gotten so hot? Keep in mind that your body is a horrible thermometer. $^*$ Metal conducts heat very well, so the metal is the same temperature as your surroundings, but it feels colder because it can take your heat away faster than other things you would touch (like a fabric seat). So yes, this part is your "imagination". The van is going to reach thermal equilibrium with the outside air at night. It won't get "more or less colder" based on how hot it got during the day. To suggest otherwise would break the second law of