How hot can we stand?

Human heat resistance is much better than we thought. In central Australia, summer temperatures in shady areas are usually 46 degrees Celsius, peaks up to 56 degrees. And if it goes up slowly, the human body will even tolerate . the boiling temperature of water.

When ships travel from the Red Sea to the Persian Gulf, although there are always ventilation fans in the ship's rooms, the temperature here is still 50 degrees Celsius.

California's Death Valley (Photo: trailmonkey)

or more. The hottest level observed in the natural world is above 57 degrees Celsius. This temperature is defined in 'death valley' in California (North America).

However, the above temperatures are all measured in the shade. Why do meteorologists have to choose such a position? That's because, only when the thermometer is placed in the shade can the air temperature be measured. If the thermometer is in the sun, the sun will smother it much more than the surrounding air, so its degree does not tell us anything about the thermal state of the environment.

Some people have conducted experiments to determine the highest temperature that a human body can tolerate . They found that in dry air, if we increased the temperature slowly, our bodies could not only tolerate the boiling temperature of water (100 ° C), but sometimes even withstand higher temperatures, coming 160 ° C. Two British physicists Bluetden and Tsenteri proved this by standing for hours in a hot toaster.

Why do humans have such high heat tolerance? That's because in fact, the human body does not receive that heat, but still maintains its body temperature close to the standard temperature. Our bodies resist by sweating. When the sweat evaporates, it will absorb a lot of the heat in the air that adheres to the skin, and makes the air temperature drop a lot.

The only necessary condition for the human body to tolerate high temperatures is that the human body does not come into direct contact with the heat source and the air must be dry. In Central Asia, it is 37 degrees hot and still relatively pleasant. But if Saint Peterburg is 24 degrees hot, we feel uncomfortable. The reason is that the air humidity in Saint Peterburg is high, and in Central Asia there is very little rain, the climate is extremely dry