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A Hot Drink on a Hot Day Can Cool You Down (www.smithsonianmag.com)

submitted 5 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 5 months ago (2 children)

This has come up for years. In some circumstances you will be cooler, if the humidity is high you're fucked. Hot and dry, sweat more, hot and wet, heat stroke.

Their answer, in short: Yes, a hot drink can cool you down, but only in specific circumstances. “If you drink a hot drink, it does result in a lower amount of heat stored inside your body, provided the additional sweat that’s produced when you drink the hot drink can evaporate,” Jay says.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Thank heavens somebody understands the laws of thermodynamics.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago

[–] [email protected] 7 points 5 months ago (1 children)

So a cool drink would work just as well, since it's also providing water you can sweat out?

So it's a matter of hydration?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (2 children)

I haven’t read the article, but I think the difference in temperature matters. Hot beverages perceived as hot through your tongue will make you sweat more/faster than cold beverages.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, this. Hot drinks make you sweat from feeling hotter internally, which will cool you off if it's not humid where you are.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I would think an ice cold spicy drink would be most effective

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago

Hmm, say a bloody Mary? 😆

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

Ah, thanks, I didn't catch that part.