Pet hypothesis regarding differing attitudes to climate change by age

[Paddy]

Premise one: human bodies to an extent generate their own body heat, primarily in response to the actions of their muscle mass; more muscular and physically active bodies generate more body heat than less muscled and less active bodies.

Premise two: muscle mass tends to peak in a person's twenties

It follows that each year would tend to feel warmer than the last to people until they hit peak muscle mass in their 20s, after which each year would tend to feel colder

It would seem to follow from this that climate change would seem more in keeping with subjective experience for younger people, and less in keeping for older people. Might this not extend to how people at different ages respond emotionally to climate change, and differing political beliefs regarding the need for action?  (Speaking in terms of overall population tendencies with many individual variations, of course).

[kassy]

Well that was not quite what i expected from the headline.

I don´t think that really holds.

We don´t feel specific temperatures but we are comfortable or not and that depends on what you wear but also on activity. Also we spend loads of time indoors.

What i personally think of as more important:

The rate of change is rather quick. It is really noticeable especially if you are old enough...and lived in the right location.

1986 was the last of the years under the long term average global temperatures.
Some of the late 70ies early 80ies winters were cold and long in the Netherlands.
I really hated winter and especially the end of it because snow is fun when it is new and it is crisp but after a couple of months you had enough. In some years it was really cold well into the end of march, too cold to just go play outside. At the end of april you actually could do that.

And that was the long term norm. ´Maart roert zijn staart , april doet wat hij wil. En in mei leggen alle vogels een ei.´ This translates as ´March turns its tail (can be like winter or spring)  April does what it wants (variable spring weather) and in May all the birds lay their eggs.

This all changed. I have seen baby chickens in february when the weather was like spring. Some of the last years there is hardly a trace of winter with very little days with snow or ice on the ground or the canals.

If you are 21 now you remember weather from lets say 2004 and on , 31 1994 and on.
But you have no experience of what the normal was like.

*

Now this should mean that the older people are even more convinced that something is off.

I have not done a survey i just know a bunch in the boomer age range or slightly younger.

Do they clue in that something is off. Yes most of them.

But at that age direct action is not an option. Many of them thrust the governments or someone to fix it. The ones that will go to marches are the ones that already were into it ages ago but they are but a few.

Sometimes people are emotionally invested otherwise. My dad is an engineer who worked on all kinds of stuff including engines and when i talked to him about engine efficiency for ICE cars and the transition to EVs all he sees is a thread to ICEs. Can´t really talk to him about the general thing to him. It does not register, then again he does not go outdoors ever which is a waste since there is so much beauty everywhere.

And other other life stages are focused on their own challenges. Working at 50 trying to not be made redundant because you need the money to put the kids through college etc.

So i would say premise people are more aware when more exposed. Farmers are feeling the effects all over the world. Office workers maybe not so much.

Then it depends on life history. Some people are more aware of what is out there even when it is not on TV while others are blind to this.

It is similar to production lines. People think oh nice garment at that price level but they usually do not wonder who picked the cotton, where they coloured it or where the runoff of that process went nor who sewed it together at what working conditions.

This is the consumerism we have been thought and it is because we are usually so far from any specific product except as we hunt it in the wild aka the shop shelf.

This same blindness extends to global warming.
And it is hard to think of the proper scenarios if you never read about it and so many people haven´t because there are more interesting soccer games or celeb divorces or foreigners to worry about all the time.

[blumenkraft]

Beware: Anecdotal evidence incoming!

I'm 46. There is no muscle mass in my body - at all. I'm always freezing when it's below 23˚C. I'm what we call a frozen dent in my country.

Climate change is on my mind since i'm 16. and back then, no muscle mass either.

[Sciguy]

I think Kassy is right on this one.  I've read many stories about older gardeners saying they plant different flowers now because of the changing climate zones.  I've read about hunters talking about how the migrations of the animals they hunt have changed due to climate change.

People who have been around long enough may remember the time when temperatures actually got colder than the baselines used to calculate the anomalies.  I think it's been more than 30 years now since we had a monthly global temperature colder than the 1950s - 1980s baselines that NASA uses.

[TerryM]

I'm 73 and moved back to this part of the world after a 41 year absence. I was more aware of the changes than those that slowly adjusted to the change. That said the oldsters have memories of when things were different, young people just read it in books.


As far as muscle mass, I think total mass - mainly the accretion of fat -  is the best insulator. I'm considerably larger than I was earlier even though my muscles have certainly atrophied. Personally neurological problems make determining temperature changes difficult. Saves lots in proper winter attire.
Terry

[nanning]

From personal experience:
I have been sitting many hours outside in the winter 52N for years. I lost weight and now have a fat percentage <12 and I can confirm what Terry wrote, that I now have much more problems in keeping warm. 4 years ago I was ca. 67 Kg and now 59 Kg. Fat acts as a heated insulating thick watertight blanket.

I am very muscular (not large muscles but muscles everywhere, such as in my kneehole ). Not from sports or fitness but from physically behaving like a child/teenager all my life.
If I am active, I am warm.
If I am not active, such as when I sit still every day for >3 hours outside in living nature, I have to put on many layers of clothing to keep warm. Many times I'm sitting there with 3 layers of separate coats on whilst some people walking by don't even wear a coat.

Outside I can get a good idea of the temperature by putting my right hand over the top of my left hand and sense the temperature difference. Accurate to +- 1C. My left hand is normally resting on my right hand which is resting on my upper left leg. In that way the palm side of my right hand keeps warm and the back of my left hand is exposed to temperature and wind. This doesn't work if it's too cold because then i'll put my hands in my coat's pockets.

[Paddy]

I may have been projecting... my own cold tolerance generally seems to have dropped off a lot in recent years. But partly that might be that I'm no longer able to keep up the habit of regularly cycling to work in all weathers with my current living / working arrangements, and partly due to my partner having a significantly lower cold tolerance still, meaning that a home environment that's comfortable for her does nothing to keep my tolerance up.

[nanning]

People should go outtside more. Climate and reality are not inside.