[SoothingDave]

To me, due to my experience growing up in Canada (mostly) after the metric change-over, having the freezing point of water at 32 seems quite counter-intuitive.

It's based on mercury. He was trying to scale his mercury themometer for maximum use. 0 deg F is as cold as he could make it and he tried to make 96 deg normal human body temp, so he could detect fevers.

Kelvins are useful for science (is there an aboslute Farenheit equivalent?)

Rankine. Same size degree as F, but zeroed at absolute. R=F+459.67

SD

[-YYZ-]

"Rankine. Same size degree as F, but zeroed at absolute. R=F+459.67"

Thanks, right, Rankine, as in the Rankine cycle, which I vaguely recall from the Thermodynamics texts.