Edit: as the comments said, I used the incorrect word. What I mean is “tolerance”
Immunity is a strong word.
You can acclimate to different environments and temperatures. Brown fat tissue can be increased when exposed to cold temperatures over a long period of time, in a form of adaptation. This type of fat helps produce heat, keeping you warmer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_adipose_tissue
There is truth to the jokes of Minnesotans wearing shorts on the same day Floridian’s would wear winter clothes.
Yeah I wouldn’t use the word immunity, I’d say you can build up a tolerance.
I am that Minnesota! I’ve been shorts and t-shirt during winter since high school.
A couple of years ago for Christmas I left my 80°F December to visit my in laws where the highs were 30°F. I had absolutely no resistance, and it was miserable. They kept their house cold because they were acclimated. I was shivering in my jacket next to the fire the whole trip.
You can build up resistance. I live in WA, when I visited Spain everyone was shocked to see me perfectly fine in just a t-shirt when it was 55 american degrees out
I’ve never seen someone refer to Fahrenheit as American degrees, but it makes sense
If you were only wearing a t-shirt, I’m betting people were more shocked at your lack of pants than your tolerance for the temperature.
55 american degrees
That’s 13 normal degrees, for the rest of us.
Yes, you can build tolerance to cold temperatures by slow gradual exposure to them. Using cold water at the end of showering and wearing one Layer of clothes less to feel slightly cool (but not freezing) works well. Aside of cold tolerance, the benefits include boosting your imune system, turning your white fat into Brown fat, which is able to burn calories (and make heat from them, that’s why you feel warmer) and lowering inflammation in your body.
You can definitely build tolerance. So long as it’s above 50°F, I’m likely to be shirtless while hiking or running. Wim Hof may be onto something in terms of what’s possible.
Be careful about the limits of adaptation. You can certainly adjust to temperatures that are colder than you’re used to. You will still die if you are inactive outside without protection below 50 degrees F (10C).
You have to get at it to die from 10°C IMO. Zero for sure, 3h sleep and you won’t wake up.
Funny mental image of man huffing and puffing trying to kill himself in a snowbank thats more mud than snow.
You don’t die from external temperatures, you die from internal temperatures.
You could die in 60° weather sleeping on rocks. Because the rocks are a great conductor of thermal energy and will drain your core temperature. That’s why when you’re camping it’s important to put some insulation between you and the ground.
So people, in the right weather conditions, could go out in freezing temperatures in a t-shirt. But if they’re out too long, or it rains, or they become less active, or if they sit down and take a nap, they’re in danger when they’re core temperature gets low enough.
For the acclimatized people, they’ve got a much bigger buffer than the unacclimatized people.
Alright, that makes sense. In the summers of my childhood, we didnt have AC so we’d lay down on the living room floor with a ceiling fan and the floor would wick away body heat. We had to be careful not to fall sleep, because if you spent too long it would make you really cold, even to the point of shivering till your teeth clacked.
Trying to become an Aes Sedai?
Run 5ks at dawn in the winter and you’ll never feel cold again.
That never worked for me. I used to run in the early morning before dawn and if it was warm I could warm up and feel good. If it was cold (yes sometimes it gets cold even in Florida) I had to run wearing layers to be able to warm up enough to feel safe running. Sweatpants over yoga pants, tank, long sleeve running shirt, jacket.
I have seen people adapt to the heat here though, and my brothers who grew up in warm climate and moved to the northeast certainly adapted.
