This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/oliver-burkeman-column/2014/oct/08/fall-better-than-summer-facts

The article has changed 2 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 0 Version 1
It's time to face facts: fall is better than summer It's time to face facts: autumn is better than summer
(35 minutes later)
Cold weather is better than hot weather. For the discerning minority of us who grasp this objective fact, the current turning of the seasons brings a delicious thrill. And frankly, we deserve a delicious thrill – because life as a cold-appreciator most of the time is tough. There are the daily micro-aggressions of weather forecasters who refer to warm weather as “good”. There’s the dawning reality that our warming climate may gradually be shifting the entire calendar on behalf of the heat fetishists. But mid-October is our moment. Months of chilly days stretch out invitingly before us. At the office, our brains start functioning properly again; outside the office, open fires and hot whiskey drinks can finally replace sunburn, insect repellent and stifling humidity.Cold weather is better than hot weather. For the discerning minority of us who grasp this objective fact, the current turning of the seasons brings a delicious thrill. And frankly, we deserve a delicious thrill – because life as a cold-appreciator most of the time is tough. There are the daily micro-aggressions of weather forecasters who refer to warm weather as “good”. There’s the dawning reality that our warming climate may gradually be shifting the entire calendar on behalf of the heat fetishists. But mid-October is our moment. Months of chilly days stretch out invitingly before us. At the office, our brains start functioning properly again; outside the office, open fires and hot whiskey drinks can finally replace sunburn, insect repellent and stifling humidity.
God knows there’s plenty of pointlessly strident opinion-writing on the internet these days, so let me be clear that I’m dealing only in blunt facts here. Here’s one: there’s a basic asymmetry between summer and winter. If you’re too cold in winter, you can always add another sweater or a coat, whereas if I’m too hot in summer, there are only so many layers I can decently remove, and in fact only so many I can remove at all, before I reach skin and have to stop. (Take-maker Matt Yglesias thinks summer-lovers confuse warmth with being on vacation; it’s only really nice to be hot if you can flop into a pool, or the sea, on a whim.)God knows there’s plenty of pointlessly strident opinion-writing on the internet these days, so let me be clear that I’m dealing only in blunt facts here. Here’s one: there’s a basic asymmetry between summer and winter. If you’re too cold in winter, you can always add another sweater or a coat, whereas if I’m too hot in summer, there are only so many layers I can decently remove, and in fact only so many I can remove at all, before I reach skin and have to stop. (Take-maker Matt Yglesias thinks summer-lovers confuse warmth with being on vacation; it’s only really nice to be hot if you can flop into a pool, or the sea, on a whim.)
Crucially, cold weather also facilitates coziness – a phenomenon so important, and so ill-served by the weedy word “coziness”, that the Danes have made it a central part of their (unusually happy) culture. They call it “hygge”. Hygge can mean hot chocolate by the fire while it’s snowing outside, but it also implies camaraderie and intimacy: it’s a social coziness, a coming together with people we love, against the encroaching cold. I know sunshine enthusiasts have their equivalent pleasures: chilled drinks on a beach with friend, say. And they probably imagine they’re just as good. They are wrong.Crucially, cold weather also facilitates coziness – a phenomenon so important, and so ill-served by the weedy word “coziness”, that the Danes have made it a central part of their (unusually happy) culture. They call it “hygge”. Hygge can mean hot chocolate by the fire while it’s snowing outside, but it also implies camaraderie and intimacy: it’s a social coziness, a coming together with people we love, against the encroaching cold. I know sunshine enthusiasts have their equivalent pleasures: chilled drinks on a beach with friend, say. And they probably imagine they’re just as good. They are wrong.
Nobody puts the case for coziness more beautifully, I reckon, than Herman Melville, in an early passage from Moby-Dick that finds the narrator keeping warm overnight at a boarding-house on the Massachusetts coast:Nobody puts the case for coziness more beautifully, I reckon, than Herman Melville, in an early passage from Moby-Dick that finds the narrator keeping warm overnight at a boarding-house on the Massachusetts coast:
To enjoy bodily warmth, some small part of you must be cold, for there is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself. If you flatter yourself that you are all over comfortable, and have been so a long time, then you cannot be said to be comfortable any more… the height of this sort of deliciousness is to have nothing but the blanket between you and your snugness and the cold of the outer air. Then there you lie like the one warm spark in the heart of an arctic crystal.To enjoy bodily warmth, some small part of you must be cold, for there is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself. If you flatter yourself that you are all over comfortable, and have been so a long time, then you cannot be said to be comfortable any more… the height of this sort of deliciousness is to have nothing but the blanket between you and your snugness and the cold of the outer air. Then there you lie like the one warm spark in the heart of an arctic crystal.
Psychologists are starting to catch up with Melville and the Danes, too: it turns out that cold weather may help you stay slim, by stimulating calorie-burning “brown fat”; that plunging into freezing water can curb physical pain; that people spend more time chatting with friends on the phone when it’s very cold; and that exposure to cold may even extend your lifespan. (It seems to do so in worms, anyway.)Psychologists are starting to catch up with Melville and the Danes, too: it turns out that cold weather may help you stay slim, by stimulating calorie-burning “brown fat”; that plunging into freezing water can curb physical pain; that people spend more time chatting with friends on the phone when it’s very cold; and that exposure to cold may even extend your lifespan. (It seems to do so in worms, anyway.)
Some may accuse me of cherrypicking my science here, since there’s also evidence that warmer weather is associated with better physical health, and better working memory, and that we spend longer chatting on the phone when it’s really hot, too. And the cold probably kills more people overall than the heat. Oh, and there’s SAD. (Though there’s also reverse-SAD.)Some may accuse me of cherrypicking my science here, since there’s also evidence that warmer weather is associated with better physical health, and better working memory, and that we spend longer chatting on the phone when it’s really hot, too. And the cold probably kills more people overall than the heat. Oh, and there’s SAD. (Though there’s also reverse-SAD.)
Still, I think we should approach all this anti-coldness evidence with a measure of skepticism – because, as I said, cold weather is better than hot weather.Still, I think we should approach all this anti-coldness evidence with a measure of skepticism – because, as I said, cold weather is better than hot weather.
Pretty much the only wholly negative thing about cold weather, in fact, is the ammunition it provides for stupid people to look at the snow and then say things like “so much for ‘global warming’!”Pretty much the only wholly negative thing about cold weather, in fact, is the ammunition it provides for stupid people to look at the snow and then say things like “so much for ‘global warming’!”
But in the spirit of the cozy season, let’s not end on a note of conflict: after all, it’s summer, not winter, that is associated with increased levels of aggression and violence. I’m not suggesting we should condemn the beach-botherers for their preferences: they were raised in a heat-centric culture, and their attitude is only to be expected. Instead, let’s extend the (snugly gloved) hand of friendship, wrap them in a warm embrace, and stride forward together into these bracing, spirit-raising months. Not a sweaty embrace, you understand; that’s the sort of unpleasantness that usually only happens in summer. Which is, incidentally, another reason why cold weather is better than hot weather.But in the spirit of the cozy season, let’s not end on a note of conflict: after all, it’s summer, not winter, that is associated with increased levels of aggression and violence. I’m not suggesting we should condemn the beach-botherers for their preferences: they were raised in a heat-centric culture, and their attitude is only to be expected. Instead, let’s extend the (snugly gloved) hand of friendship, wrap them in a warm embrace, and stride forward together into these bracing, spirit-raising months. Not a sweaty embrace, you understand; that’s the sort of unpleasantness that usually only happens in summer. Which is, incidentally, another reason why cold weather is better than hot weather.