If you are outdoors in a cold polar region during the day what will keep you warmer?

Details: The color is on the outside, the inside you can assume is a neutral gray for simplicity.

#physics #science #STEM #outdoors #survival

@freemo

Black absorbs more EM than white, but black objects also radiate more. All matter above 0 degrees K radiate EM known as "black body radiation". Black objects radiate that energy more quickly than white objects, so they get cold more quickly.

"During the day in a polar region", means that in the dead of winter it's dark out, even at noon. (The question didn't specify the season.) If the sun is below the horizon or very low in the sky (i.e., traveling through a lot of atmosphere), the solar EM wouldn't be much, in which case the black would radiate more energy than the white, and the inside would get colder.

Also, even if there is some sun, the surface of the coat is on the outside of the insulation, so any heat that it absorbs would quickly radiate back out into the air before that heat could penetrate the insulation to help warm you up.

I didn't look any of this up, it all from memory so I can't guarantee it's accuracy.

@Pat That last sentence looked a bit off to me. Isn't it "I didn't look any of this up, it's all from memory so I can't guarantee its accuracy."?

@freemo

@trinsec @freemo

Yeah, I kind of scrambled my plurals/possessives on the "it"s.

Dyslexia seems to be acting up at the moment for some reason, I 'm making all kinds mistakes in my writing...

@Pat

Hmmm dyslexia. I wish i had that "excuse" :)

@trinsec

@freemo @trinsec

A lot people have undiagnosed dyslexia. I've noticed that you often confuse things like "your" and "you're". You may have it and not know it.

@Pat

I use your by default mostly because I type to fast and dont review what I write. Couple that with the fact that i got into the habit by typing on my phone where an apostrophe is a bit tedious. That particular error, as most of my errors, are largely due to not caring and typing as fast as I can since i dont find the medium to be critical for correctness.

My formal writeups, as well as my blogs, tend to have very few errors since I proof read them.

That said my natural rate of errors has been unusually high the last 2 years since my injury and COVID largely due to the extremely high levels of stress I've been under which seems to effect the prevelance.

@trinsec

@freemo @Pat

Oh man...

Ok the real challenge here is to find a sentence without mistakes. ;)

@trinsec

hahaha valid. Honestly if i could actually edit posts on here there would be a lot fewer of them. At least on matrix i will occasionally correct my mistakes. Here I see them but usually after i already posted and only once i reread it when going over replies.

@Pat

@freemo I do tend to delete and redraft in the first minute or so, and if nobody's replied yet. Otherwise it is a 'oh shit, oh well, move on, next time better'.

@Pat

@trinsec

I used to do that but with 20K some followers it pissed off a lot of people, way more than just keeping the typos.

@Pat

@freemo Heh... valid point.
That said, I tend to take like 10 minutes per email just to make sure my answer makes total sense and contains no mistakes. I tend to do the same for my initial toots often as well.

@Pat