Something to Warm the Heart

Considering the frigid temperature, I thought it was an appropriate time to write a little post about the numerous ways to measure temperature. Be forewarned, there are far more temperature measurement scales than you probably think.

Here goes:

In 1692 or 1701 (Straight Dope versus “A Brief History of Temperature Measurement“) Danish astronomer Ole Christensen Rømer invented the Rømer scale. The freezing point of water was approximately 7.5 degrees while the boiling point was 60 degrees.

Around 1700, Isaac Newton devised a scale where 0 degrees was the freezing point of water, and 33 degrees was its boiling point.

1724 found the Fahrenheit scale coming to fruition as the brainchild of German physicist Daniel Fahrenheit who arbitrarily declared 32 degrees to be the freezing point of water and 212 degrees to be its boiling point.

Next in line to invent a temperature scale seems to be French scientist René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur who proposed his scale in 1730. His scale placed the freezing point of water at 0 degrees and the aquatic boiling point at a nice, round 80 degrees. This scale was popular through much of Europe for a time.

In 1732, French astronomer Joseph-Nicolas Delisle followed quickly on Réaumur’s coattails setting his boiling point at 0 degrees. The freezing point of his scale was 150 degrees. This scale was popular for a time in Russia, where it was invented (yes, by a Frenchman, but while he was in Russia.)

Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius took his stab at creating a temperature scale in 1742, where 100 degrees represented the freezing point of water and 0 degrees marked its boiling point. Two years later Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus flipped the values and gave us, essentially, the Celsius scale we know today.

British engineer and physicist William Thomson (also known as Lord Kelvin) threw his hat into the ring in 1848 by creating the first absolute temperature scale where 0 degrees marked the lack of all thermal energy. His scale placed the freezing point of water at a lofty 273.15 degrees and the boiling point one hundred degrees higher at 373.15. Thus the Kelvin scale was born to the joy of physicists everywhere.

Not to be outdone, fellow British engineer and physicist William Rankine proposed his own absolute scale, now conveniently known as the Rankin scale and used by almost no one. The lack of all thermal energy was still 0 degrees. Water’s freezing point on the Rankin scale put the Kelvin scale to shame by placing it at a record high degree number of 491.67. Boiling point was 671.641 degrees.

There are a number of other temperature scales, besides these. There is the Ducrest scale, invented in 1740 that placed the “temperature of the earth” at 0 degrees and boiling point at 100 degrees. There are an Edinburgh, Florentine and Leiden (or Leyden) scales. There were the Dalton scale, the Hale scale and the Wedgewood scale as well, the last seemingly related to kiln temperatures when firing ceremics invented by Englishman Josiah Wedgewood, grandfather of Charles Darwin.

As if all that weren’t enough, there’s also the Scoville scale which measures the hotness or spiciness of peppers, named after American chemist Wilbur Scoville, its inventor. It’s not an actual temperature scale, but try a bite of Bhut Jolokia and tell me it doesn’t feel like real heat.

PS:  This article seems pretty Eurocentric.  If you know about none-European temperature scales, or just more about the last few temperature scales I mentioned, let me know.