How To Learn Celsius Temperatures in Seconds | Metric For 'Mericans! 🇺🇸

If you grew up in the United States, you probably don't have an intuitive sense of the Metric System. This video is for you! In this video, I will help you learn the trick you need to master Celsius, and eventually the rest of the Metric (S.I.) System of measures. This is absolutely necessary if you want to take your vacation in Europe and actually understand what temperature people say it is when they warn you how hot it'll be outside. This one trick could save your whole trip!

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Intro and outro music: Overture of Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) by Mozart

00:00 Intro
00:35 Context & Shockers
00:57 Guess: Multiple Choice!
03:52 parlo romano
04:00 The Celsius Trick!
05:36 Getting Into Trouble
09:30 Practice Using Celsius on your Smartphone
10:04 Rhyme in Latin!
11:02 Outtakes & Wildlife
11:59 Stinger

[polyMATHY_Luke]

ERRATA: I know that it’s spelled le Système International, without the final -e. The error occurred by chance, not ignorance. It’s very hard to work with text in videos, and each video takes many days to make, which means the brain tends to filter out errors and interpret typographical errors as correct. If you look, you’ll find typographical errors in all my videos, with text in English or Latin or whatever language.

[ashwinnmyburgh]

As someone who has always used the metric system and never understood the Imperial, I am always terrified for a few moments when I see temperatures in the Imperial, since it either looks like the sun has exploded or it has disappeared. 75 degrees, for example, in celsius would be DEADLY but in Fahrenheit is apparently the equivalent of around 24 degrees Celcius ( a rather nice day).

[KrzysztofBob]

-20 - home freezer temperature,
0 - water freezes, winter in New York
5 - fridge temperature
10 - typical cold tap water temp, mid Spring or Autumn in New York
20 - room temperature
30 - hot summer in New York
37 - average body temperature
40 - high fever (requires medical attention)
60 - typical hot tap water temp
100 - water boils
200 - oven temperature (baking, most common)

[garyjmcqueen]

If you're from Scotland: 30 is death, 20 is hot, 10 is t-shirt weather, 0 is not.

[kellyd]

I’ve been using almost the same thing with my students “0 is ice and 20 is nice”. This is a good way to make it more intuitive.

[eugeneomalley]

I am a retired engineer living in Ireland. My primary school education was exclusively in imperial units (feet, pounds etc). My university courses were a mixture of both. The electrical department used SI but the mechanical department used imperial so I am inherently fluent in both systems.

The most dramatic news story I have come across relating to confusion between imperial and metric units was the incident of Air Canada flight 143 from Montreal to Edmonton on July 23rd 1983 which became known as the "Gimli glider". Air Canada were in the process of converting from imperial to metric and in the confusion between pounds and kilograms meant they loaded only half the fuel needed. Needless to say they didn't make the journey, but the outcome was without casualty and can be viewed on YouTube.

[TransSappho]

Weirdly enough, 3d printing is what got me used to millimeters more than anything else. Inches are such a clunky unit when you’re working with that level of precision that they’re functionally useless

[heronimousbrapson]

When we converted to metric measures for many things here in Canada in the '70's, it was just easier to switch thinking to metric units rather than to try to convert back to the imperial equivalent. For example, it became easier to think of distances in kilometers alone, particularly when car odometers amd speedometers and all the road signage became metric.

[robertthomson]

Love the Latin version of the rhyme.

It's more than 50 years since Australia decided to move to the metric system, and it's well and truly engrained now.

[VOTE-jwqy]

Entertaining, informative and well produced. 30 is hot, 20 is nice, 10 is cool, and 0 is ice. A game changer 🙂

[Fluffian]

Man, i remember doing this when the Euro was introduced when i was a kid. Multiplied everything by two to get the price in German Marks initially, but before you know it, you've shifted your entire way of thinking about money to the new currency, and now i need to convert when my grandma talks about old prices. Great way of learning how to multiply, though!

[NikonKanava]

For us Finns

30 is lava
20 is fire
10 is normal
0 too warm
-10 nice
-20 pretty cold
-30 too cold

[jeff__w]

As someone in the US (who thinks the Imperial system is nuts), I've been doing this for about a decade— both my mobile and my computer show Celsius so I have a good intuitive sense for the temperature scale.

Decades ago, during President Carter’s short-lived push to change the US over to metric, a friend complained that she didn't want to have to “convert” gallons to liters and feet to meters and I said she didn’t _have to_ — she just had to have an idea of what those measurements _were_ — it didn’t matter what they happened to be in the other units she was used to. (She didn’t know _exactly_ what a foot or a gallon was, either—no one does—she just had an intuitive sense of what they were.)

[pterispertinax]

Fun fact: "Summer" in Sweden is defined as when the average temperature exceeds 10 degrees Celsius.

[eliseamiot]

I'm from Quebec so I'm very familiar with Celsius, However when I'm talking to my American friends my trick is: 16 is 61, 28 is 82, 0 is freezing. The minuses get more tricky. Minus 11 is about 11. And of course minus 40 is minus 40.

[neliros]

As someone who used imperial system growing up (Fahrenheit, feet, inches, etc) metric and centigrade are so much easier. Started using Celsius temperatures after high school chemistry showed me how much more sense it made over Fahrenheit. I also like just being different 😂

[SpenserLi]

I grew up in Celsius and since lived in the states for 10+ years. My mental conversion is knowing 0C is roughly 30F, and 35C is roughly 100F, that means every 10F is roughly 5C so you get 0-30, 5-40, 10-50, 15-60, 20-70, 25-80, 30-90, 35-100 and these are good enough for determine what I should wear really.

[brennanmaynard]

When you started explaining the reasons why you taught it this way, I began to notice the similarities with your linguistic teaching philosophy, and I am immediately understood why you have this on your Polýmathy channel. And suddenly I was like, “Bravo, Luke. Bravo.”

[cedainty]

I love the metric system! It is much easier to compute measurements using metrics!

[RomanMines]

I just have to say something, you are absolutely amazing at doing arguments. you pick your words so carefully, and you are just very convincing with how you lay out your videos