June 25, 2009
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Would you survive?
Would you have survived 100 years ago where you live without Air conditioning?
Ever since my last bout of Pneumonia I can not have Air Conditioning in our house. A/C makes my lungs hurt. When people find this out they tend to be shocked. They don’t see how we can survive in the summer without A/C.I find it funny because Air Conditioners in people’s houses are a moderately new invention. It hasn’t been that long that people have had them in their houses and now people are saying that they wouldn’t survive the Summer without them.
Do you have A/c in your house?
Do you think that you need it or would you be ok without it?
Comments (46)
I’m pretty sure that I could survive without air conditioning. I’d just go in the pool or take a really cold bath or something.
i could do it. when i worked as a camp counselor for many summers, we never had ac.
You never been to the midwest U.S.? I swear it’s getting hotter every year and we practically never get snow anymore.
Maybe Air conditioners are nature’s response to global warming (or vice-versa, lol).
yes , we live here in NC and do not use it all the time
Actually, I only have AC in two rooms of my house. In the others we just make do without the AC or hang out only in the rooms that have it. I can hold out pretty long without it, I can just about make it to when the days are all 90 degrees (maybe mid-July). I definitely prefer to have it, especially since summers seem to be getting hotter. But when I don’t have it, I try to cope by wearing light, loose clothing, and drinking a lot of liquids.
I grew up without it on the coast. But where I live now, in Houston, it is necessary. Yes, people lived here 100 years ago without it. But, 100 years ago they had grass and trees where there is now nothing but concrete and pollution. I don’t use it a lot in the spring and fall but, in the summer when it is 105+ and the ozone levels are severe, I have to turn it on.
@Lynnjynh9315 - Almost never snows? You must not be talking about the portion of the Midwest known as the Upper Plains… my family lives in Fargo, and it definitely still snows
But it also is getting more extreme in the summer, too. It’s like the pendulum is swinging farther in each direction but somehow missing the middle part…
That being said, when I lived in the Midwest, I used AC. Humidity makes me feel ill. Since I’ve moved to Idaho, my husband and I haven’t even plugged in the AC that came with our apartment. Our apartment gets a great cross-breeze which takes care of most of the heat. If we were still back in Fargo-Moorhead, I know my husband would not want to use the AC, but he can walk around with no shirt, and I can’t. Therefore, I would be advocating for moderate use of the AC (especially since Fargo had 90% humidity yesterday).
We never had an air conditioner when I was at home; we now live in a mobile home. I think living in a house without an air conditioner is entirely possible, however, I think it could be damaging to one’s health to be constantly in the heat that a mobile trailer traps…it can go well over 100 degrees without an AC, and there is much less oxygen and air flow than outdoors at 100 degrees. I guess a century ago there were no such things as trailers, either.
We are moving to a house with lots of shade trees; a house with an attic and basement to further cool/insulate the main floor. I look forward to not having window AC’s; we have central air, but since my husband and I are very energy-and-cost aware, we probably won’t use it much.
We also live in NW Pennsylvania. Summers are cooler here.
I think one thing to remember is that when it gets hot, it is better to be outside than inside if there is no air conditioner. It will be infinitely hotter inside even with all the windows open than it will be staying in the house.In the south, there is a tradition of sitting outside on front porches. Guess why? Its cooler outside than in. I lived for so long without air conditioning that it is more of a bother to me than a blessing. The thing is, we are so used to having a temperature controlled area that we have stopped letting our bodies naturally adjust to the temperature outside. If you are outside almost all day when it starts getting warmer, yes you will feel heat, but it won’t be the same heat that others who are used to sixty or seventy degrees will feel. When I moved in with my dad he worried for a long time because I told him it wasn’t necesary to cool the room i am in most. He finally realized that when it was warm, I just took whatever I was doing out on the front porch, and took care of dishes and cooking for the day in the early hours or while the sun was setting. You adapt to these things. Now, when I walk into his office in the house I am freezing. (over 100 to sixty in two seconds?) Now That right there can’t be good for one’s health. I think it is better to let your body adapt to the temperature naturally than to force it to stay used to certain conditions that may not always be there. If you are hot, then you do something to distract yourselves.
And as for not surviving without it, what about the men in the south who work jobs like construction outdoors? the temperature gets well over one hundred, they survive, but they grew up here and now how to handle themselves.
@Pensamientos@revelife - I agree.
I had someone online though once accuse me of child abuse because we do not have A/C. It didn’t matter to her that we are all perfectly happy or that my lungs hurt in A/C….nope…it had to be child abuse you know.
@Kristenmomof3 - I think it’s more kind to let them learn to cope with the heat, and I am assuming you are not forcing them to stay in the house during the summer. It’s so commonplace around here for people to not have air conditioning that an accusation of that being child abuse would be laughed at. Even a lot of the people here who “have” air conditioning, are not able to run it all summer long and will only turn it on in the extreme heat of midday because it gets really expensive. But most of us don’t really bat an eye at the heat either, sure we complain about it sometimes, but if you turn around to someone here and say, “yeah, but aren’t you glad summer’s over?” They laugh and agree whole heartedly with you.
We have AC but generally only use it when we have company or someone is sick and we figure the expense to make them a little less uncomfortable is worth it. We compensate by using fans to pull cooler air through our house in the early morning and late at night.
I hate AC. I don’t like cold air blowing on me. I think people could survive–most of them would just either have to move to a more temperate climate or wear less clothes! Heat usually doesn’t start bothering me until it gets into the upper 90′s, so I’m pretty sure I’d survive without AC in my house. In my car, though? I would definitely need AC there.
With how often we are over 100F here, I’d be uncomfortable, but I’d survive. Considering I consider comfortable to be 82F, I;d be fine. Winter without a heater though, even the relatively mild Texas winter, I’d die. Well, probably not die, but I’d be miserable.
@Pensamientos@revelife - People often asked me how I dealt with working lot at Home Depot, wherein I spent 8 hour a day under the Texas sun on a black asphalt parking lot. It really doesn’t take long at all for it to not bother you, so long as you stay hydrated.
I live in southern Alabama, where it’s not unusual for it to get over 100 during the summer. When I was younger we lived in a 150 year old house that only had A/C in the living room. My bedroom had a fan that I would turn on a lot, but once you get used to it, it isn’t that bad. I can handle the cold a lot better than the heat, though. You can keep putting clothes on to stay warm, but you can only take so many off!
During the summer in my apartment I keep it from 75 during the day and down to 72 at night. In the winter I rarely turn on the heat, unless I just feel too cold to move.
i think i’d be okay without it b/c i didn’t have a/c in my car for many years. my car would be so hot after sitting in the sun all day and so that was tough…but bearable. here in the midwest i had to work/play outside a few summers w/ children in the 90 plus degree sweltering humidity and little shade. lol. so, you learn to bring frozen water bottles and take a lot of breaks. but my heart and lungs seem to prefer the cooler temps — so i do appreciate the a/c when it’s over 88/high humidity and available. i’m not as bothered as much by dry/hot heat though
Nah not I. My back stick to my chair already WITH A/C. Without A/C the chair goes where ever I go lol.
Here in the Southwest US, even though it can get up to the 100′s but stay mostly in the high 80′s and 90′s in the summer months, we have what are called “evaporative coolers” otherwise known as “swamp coolers”. The won’t work in an area of high humidity. They work on the principle of introducing water droplets into the air and cool the interior of the house that way. It consists of a rotating drum with an spongy element attached to it that goes thru water and then a fan blows the water droplets on the element into the house, thus cooling the air tempurature. They are also much cheaper to run. All it is, is a fan motor and a pulley attached to it to rotate the drum. I only run it when it gets unbearable for a little while, with other fans circulating the air around. Also having your blinds drawn and dark colored curtains to block the suns rays makes a HUGE difference to keep your house cool. At night, I set a fan in the window to draw in the cool night air, but last night it didn’t get very cool. Also my place has cement walls. It make sense that the original inhabitants of these area made adobe brick houses because they are cool inside
I agree with the writer from Fargo-Moorhead. I spent a summer in MPLS and the heat was unbearable to me. 90 degrees with 90% humidity, even in the woods when camping! Unbearable!
Here in the UK we don’t have air conditioning. In South Africa we only had air conditioning at work – certainly not in the houses.
@Kristenmomof3 - lol…child abuse for not owning a/c is ridiculous. My family started using it only recently, but it always feels uneccessarily cold, so we only turn it on when it’s overly humid.
I’ve only had an air conditionner for the past few years — before then I survived just fine, with a few bad sleepless nights where I was so hot and sticky I would take a water bottle and spray myself with cold water
I think we would all survive, just be a little bit less comfortable!
I think it also depends where you live….humid places tend to have very very thick air, which makes it hard to breathe
hehe
it’s hard to enjoy your day, sleep well, etc when that happens
but you’d still survive
Our air conditioner went out two years ago and we’ve more than “survived” without it. Right now its in the 90′s here in Indiana, and well, sometimes you just have to suck it up.
obviously, if people could survive before, they can survive now. My old house didn’t have an AC and it got really hot, but you learn about opening your windows up at night, keeping the blinds and windows closed during the day, dressing cool and if you’re that hot, NOT. MOVING. lol. I think that people feel like they couldn’t survive without AC now, because we are a society that’s always on the go. And if you really think about it, in hot weather, AC allows us to always be on the go. Back when AC was not common, people would take time out in the middle of the day and just chill on their porches fanning themselves because there was no other way to deal with the heat. You know? People made the time in the day to deal with the heat. People these days refuse to do so.
@siobhan21156 - I was out in the desert and I stayed at a friends house and they had one of those swamp coolers. I’m from MN and yeah, the humidity gets so unbearable up here. People don’t really understand that MN has HIGH humidity because of all the lakes. It gets so sticky. Despite the misconceptions we do not have snow all year round hahahaha
I live in Washington state…..the land of wet air…..yep, I can live without an A/C
@radicalramblings - Yeah, Houston heat is the worst! I’m more near Galveston though and it feels lovely at night when the sun is gone. XD
i don’t think i could do it.
i love my cold air way too much.
xD
We didn’t have air conditioning in Japan and we got by just fine. We have it here in Georgia and I’ve been thinking lately about how spoiled I’m getting with it. I don’t think we’d use it as much if we had to pay our own bills.
@x_Butterflies_and_Hurricanes_x - My father was born in Moorhead and I still have relatives in MN. I agree, it’s all those lakes that cause the humidity – and breed mosquitoes. Yes I would rather tolerate the MN winters than those summers.
Also in the old days, the folks in the Southwest had their siestas.
Forgot to add, when I lived in AZ, Phoenix at one time when I-17 was put in, they had down the center of the highway orange trees. When the city grew, they had to widen the highway and, of course, tore out the orange trees for more traffic lanes. Now Phoenix is practically paved over and the heat is unrelenting because of the lack of tress, no trees to take the carbon dioxide from all emissions from all the industries, automobiles and convert it into oxygen, because the asphalt (especially) and concrete absorb the heat of the day and you can feel it coming off the roadway at 11PM, so it never gets a chance to really cool down there. Here in Albuquerque, we have lots of trees and that does help to make for cooler nights.
I live in Los Angeles and believe it or not, no air conditioner in our house! Actually, we really don’t need it. We live on the coast and we get a cool sea breeze every night that cools the house.
Yeah, I had a year without air conditioning in college, and a second year with air conditioning so out-of-whack that it might as well not count.
It did get to me though, because I have really bad seasonal allergies that were definitely made worse by having the windows open all day in the summer. I was so doped up on benedryl that I might as well have slept through those entire 2 years xD
We put in central air early this spring and are loving it! We could clearly do without it, as we have for years. Swamp coolers work well in a hot, dry climate. But AC is cleaner. Cleaner air is better.
Of course!
Even people in poverty-laden Africa HAVE survived without air-conditioning at all!
As for me, well, we have electric fans in the house, but no air-conditioning because we can’t afford it.
I don’t have an A/C in my house, and I’m fine. However, that’s because I live in San Francisco. When I went to Japan in the summer. It was HOOOOT. SO HUMID! Mind you, I was in southern Japan, where it got RIDICUOUSLY hot. Standing in the shade was USELESS. I don’t think I would’ve survived without an A/C, fan, or uchiwa at my disposal. D:
-Kunoichi
I HATE air conditioning so much. I’d jump up and down and celebrate for a year if it all of a sudden ceases to exist.
No but seriously, I really wish it didn’t exist. During summer, I can just use a fan most of the time which is always enough for me, or I can just splash cold water on myself. But whatever season it is, destroy the AC, people!!! Even when it’s boiling outside, AC in the room always, always freezes me to death and gets me a cold. And don’t even remind me of that one time when my roommate left the AC on ALL day while we were out (during summer). When we came back, I seriously considered moving out for the whole night, I couldn’t even stay in the room for one second, I stayed in the hallways until midnight, and then shivered in my bed as my blankets still felt as if they were taken straight out of the refrigerator. Sorry for this rant, but I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate the AC!!!
The heat in Bangladesh in UNBEARABLE! a/c is a must for us now…………
But yet again so many poor people are living without /c, I am sure I can live without it………adapting to nature has to work for me to survive!
LOL Easily. I absolutely adore heat. I will quite happily live my life without AC in near 40degree heat. The fan is turned on only because my dad cannot stand heat. The rest of us don’t really care. I cannot, on the other hand, stand cold. I used to wear seven layers, a scarf, a pair of mittens and a pair of gloves over the mittens to school. And when I took my mittens and gloves off, my nails were still purple and I would still have hands colder than ice. If I could have, I would have crawled into the heaters.
Call me spoiled… but i live in Texas. I don’t think i could survive here in this state without A/C. But if i lived further up north, then yeah. I could live withough it i assume.
@Job_One_21 - it is good to see you back online
I’ve got it, and I am sure that I’d be pretty well uncomfortable without it…For a week or so.
Then, just as I’ve become accustomed to having it, I would become accustomed to not having it and would adapt. I might, still being an imperfect human, groan and whine a little bit. Heck, knowing me I’d raise all kinds of fuss. But then I’d realize those things weren’t changing the situation and that they were failing to be “content in whatsoever state I am in” and I’d repent. Then I’d go about inventing a new way to moderate the temperature. Because that’s how God made us… creative, inventive. He gave us brains that are capable of coming up with crazy ideas like using fiberglass to insulate homes, and using electricity to power some sort of device that keeps a house at 68 degrees when it’s 101 outside.
Having these things isn’t the problem. It’s demanding them, feeling as though we are entitled to them that is the problem.
It’s the lack of complete gratefulness to the Lord for giving us so much abundance that’s the issue.
We don’t have A/C at home, since I live in the UK, we have a couple of electric fans.
living in arizona i would die.
of course we would have been able to survive without air conditioning 100 years ago…that’s what we would be used to. people say they can’t live without it, because they are spoiled to having it. i prefer to have it, but sure, I could live it without it, we all could if we had to. my grandparents don’t have it in their house.
Most homes and businesses don’t have it here. There are only a couple of weeks where it is needed and that is not worth the expense usually. But I love having a car with it, and it will make the difference if I come home from work hot cranky and exhausted or cool and ready to take on chores.
I couldn’t it gets as hot as 112 degrees where I live and I overheat fairly easily. I don’t need to faint