I see this a lot, too. "It's just 2 degrees" – what the hell is wrong with you? If your body temperature is 2-3 degrees above normal, you feel like absolute shit.
Likewise for atmospheric CO₂ concentrations; "it's just 0.04 %" – dude, you surely start noticing the effects of "just" 0.04% alcohol in your blood. Or hey, try cyanide.
But this isn't about body temperature or alcohol concentrations, so comparisons like that are not useful.
Look, I just had a glass of cool water, perhaps between five to ten degrees celsius. And I'm about to have a coffee. What's that, fifty degrees? With 5% to 10% milk concentration. And I think I'll be just fine. You don't?! What the hell is wrong with you?
If you want to explain why a two-degree increase in average temperature on the planet is dramatic, then you need to do better than compare it to something completely different.
No, you are underestimating the fact that people already understand how average temperature works, especially folks they have ever lived in a modest home with no AC.
If someone's home is 24-26C, and they turn on their oven to cook something for dinner, it will warm up their home, depending on the size of their home and ventilation.
Overall the average temperature increase won't be that much, but they localized temperature increase is very dramatic. Your apartment might not be hot, but that small area that is 200C is having a dramatic impact on everything else in your apartment.
Bonus points for extra comprehension if they have a basement or ground floor that has a substantially lower temperature. Again, the average temperature might be high, but it doesn't mean that it's hot everywhere in the house.
Understanding this isn't rocket science, and the only reason people are ignoring it is because people in power have a vested interest in keeping people ignorant of it by outright lying, obfuscating, or denying it.
A change in average temperature (either direction) does not imply extreme temperature swings. My current apartment is much warmer than my previous apartment! I'm not dying, and the extreme temperatures at the oven or the cool parts of the apartment are not any more extreme than they were before. And no, I haven't ever noticed my oven having a dramatic impact on everything else in my apartment. So, no, this kind of appeal to intuition about the average temperature in an apartment does not help explain why 2degC across the globe means more than just.. a bit warmer temperature. And most certainly comparing it to something like body temperature (which tends to be very steady compared to air temperature) does not help at all.
If my room was 2 degrees hotter right now, I would barely notice. So "2 degrees" by itself actually really does mean very little even to me - and I already know about the catastrophic effects that are going to come out of 2 degrees. I have to think about the sea level rise, increasing heat waves, more floods, more extreme weather, and so on for it to actually have an impact on even me.
You're right in a sense. I would certainly notice the change if it happened very quickly. However, I would quickly adapt and think it was just normal. (Mind you, my room is about 17 C at the moment.)
Certainly, if someone told me my room was going to be 2 degrees hotter permanently, I wouldn't think twice about it.
> However, I would quickly adapt and think it was just normal.
This definitely does not happen to me in these temperature ranges. 32 is too hot to function no matter how long I sit there. 30 is livable, but permanent discomfort. 28 is more or less ok, through I prefer lower temperatures.
You can feel how those differences affect your body.
Likewise for atmospheric CO₂ concentrations; "it's just 0.04 %" – dude, you surely start noticing the effects of "just" 0.04% alcohol in your blood. Or hey, try cyanide.
What is wrong with people?!