How air conditioning changed the American landscape, transformed our politics

[JustRalph]

MONDAY, JUL 5, 2010 13:01 ET

http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2010/07/05/losing_our_cool_air_conditioning_ext2010/index.html

""Losing Our Cool": The high price of staying cool
How air conditioning changed the American landscape, transformed our politics, and is endangering our health

In the last half century, air conditioning has joined fireworks, swimming pools and charred hamburgers as a ubiquitous ingredient of an American summer. It’s no exaggeration to say it has changed the way this country functions, shaping everything from where we’re willing to live (Las Vegas, anyone?) to the amount of sex we have (more: It’s never too hot to get it on when the A.C. is blasting). Nine out of 10 new homes in this country are built with central air conditioning, and Americans now use as much electricity to power our A.C. as the entire continent of Africa uses for, well, everything. It has so thoroughly scrambled our way of life that when the National Academy of Engineering chose its 20 greatest engineering accomplishments of the last century, A.C. not only made the list, it clocked in ahead of spacecraft, highways and even the Internet.

But as science writer Stan Cox argues in his new book, "Losing Our Cool: Uncomfortable Truths About Our Air-Conditioned World (and Finding New Ways to Get Through the Summer)," the dizzying rise of air conditioning comes at a steep personal and societal price. We stay inside longer, exercise less, and get sick more often — and the electricity used to power all that A.C. is helping push the fast-forward button on global warming. The invention has also changed American politics: Love it or hate it, refrigerated cooling has been a major boon to the Republican Party. The advent of A.C. helped launch the massive Southern and Western population growth that’s transformed our electoral map in the last half century. Cox navigates all of these scientific and social angles with relative ease, providing a clear explanation of how A.C. made the leap from luxury to necessity in the United States and examining how we can learn to manage the addiction before we refrigerate ourselves into the apocalypse.
more at the link

Salon spoke to Cox about our jonesing for cold air, how A.C. lands Republicans in the White House, and why Congress should be forced to meet outside in the summer. "

more at the link

sometimes I just gotta laugh..........these people actually get paid for writing this stuff......... :lol:

[ElKabong]

i agree w/ the article, only to the extent of.....

long story short, i keep my therm set at 80 in the summer, 62 in the winter...low utility bills, yes...but the biggest benefit is my allergies are far better when i use the central ac and heat far less than i did in the 1980s....my bro's doc told him about this 30 yrs ago, worked for him (his wife hates it of course)....and works for me as well. when he told me about it, i tried it. glad i did

i also get used to the normal seasons of hot/ cold better than most folks my age...winters don't get to me as bad as it does some, same for the heat...i see a lot of benefits to it..

down side is, infants, the elderly, and people in the house that get sick should have the a/c or heat up to norm or above levels...but there's no reason for an avg adult to sit in a 72 degree hoouse in the winter (like my relatives in MN do) or sit in a 74 degree overly a/c cooled home (like everyone on my block does)...it's a waste of money and can bring on colds, etc much easier

as for the political slant of the article, the guy is taking a moronic stance there

[WinterTriangle]

Ralph,
super interesting subject. Perhaps Stan Cox wrote some magazine articles way back before the book came out, as I remember reading something like this, many years ago, in The New Yorker or something, back in 2006.

I remember thinking about some of the changes A/C has made and it got me thinking.

I believe it has cut people off from each other, and neighborhoods. Everyone used to sit out on the porch in the summer, after dinner. Now, it's like a ghosttown. Heck, we were out in the street, playing kickball, until it was almost pitch dark, and parents sitting out on porch, watching. People knew their neighborhoods and neighbors, and watched each other's kids.

I went to elementary school in florida.........no a/c. Today, they would close the schools if children had to sit and study and work in the kind of heat we did.

AND, we walked 8-10 blocks to school every day. In that heat. We were acclimated to it.

I was reading for the social impact stuff......never occurred to me that there were political implications. :) But it really is an interesting subject as part of the former