Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit
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| Born | 24 May 1686 (14 May Old Style) Danzig (Gdańsk), Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
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| Died | 16 September 1736 (aged 50) |
| Known for | Precision thermometry Alcohol thermometer Mercury-in-glass thermometer Fahrenheit scale Fahrenheit hydrometer |
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| Fields | Physics (thermometry) |
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Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit was a famous physicist, inventor, and maker of scientific instruments. He was born in Poland to a German family. When he was 15, he moved to the Dutch Republic and lived there for the rest of his life (from 1701 to 1736). Fahrenheit was a pioneer in measuring temperature accurately. He helped create modern temperature measurement by inventing the mercury-in-glass thermometer and the Fahrenheit scale.
About Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit
Fahrenheit was born in Danzig (now Gdańsk), which was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth at the time. His family were German merchants. When he was 15, in 1701, both his parents died from eating poisonous mushrooms. After this sad event, he started training to be a merchant in Amsterdam.
However, Daniel was much more interested in science. He soon began studying and experimenting in this field. From 1717, he traveled to many important cities like Berlin, Halle, Leipzig, Dresden, and Copenhagen. During his travels, he met or talked with other famous scientists, including Ole Rømer and Gottfried Leibniz.
In 1717, Fahrenheit settled in The Hague. He worked as a glassblower, creating scientific tools such as barometers, altimeters, and thermometers. From 1718 onwards, he also taught chemistry in Amsterdam. In 1724, he visited England. That same year, he was chosen as a Fellow of the Royal Society, which is a very respected group of scientists. Fahrenheit died in The Hague in 1736 when he was 50 years old. He was buried in the Kloosterkerk (Cloister Church) in The Hague.
The Fahrenheit Temperature Scale
Fahrenheit is most famous for creating the Fahrenheit scale, which is a way to measure temperature. In 1724, he explained how he set up his scale using three main points.
- The first point, which he called 0°F, was the lowest temperature he could make. He did this by mixing ice, water, and salt. The thermometer was placed in this cold mixture, and the liquid inside dropped to its lowest point.
- The second point was when water just started to freeze. He set this as 30°F.
- The third point was the temperature of the human body. He measured this by placing the thermometer under the arm or in the mouth and set it as 90°F.
Later, scientists adjusted the Fahrenheit scale. They found that water boils about 180 degrees above its freezing point. So, the scale was redefined to make the difference between water's freezing point and boiling point exactly 180 degrees. This made calculations easier because 180 can be divided by many numbers. Because of this change, the normal human body temperature is now considered 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, not 96 degrees as it was on Fahrenheit's original scale.
The Fahrenheit scale was the main way to measure temperature in English-speaking countries for things like weather, industry, and medicine until the 1970s. Today, most of the world uses the Celsius scale. However, the United States still commonly uses the Fahrenheit scale for daily temperatures and weather reports.
See also
- Fahrenheit hydrometer
- List of German inventors and discoverers
- People from Gdańsk (Danzig)
- Anders Celsius
