Korean Fan Death

http://istommydrunk.svbtle.com/sudden-fan-death

by tomasien • 12 years ago

78 97 12 years ago

istommydrunk.svbtle.com

serialx• 12 years ago

Every fan in South Korea has an automatic shut-off feature - you can’t even buy a fan that will run all night. Impossible to purchase.

This statement is simply not true. I live in South Korea and I always run it all night in summer.

flippyhead• 12 years ago

Are you certain you are alive?

murbard22• 12 years ago

Who are you talking to?

ddoolin3• 12 years ago

Came here to say the same thing. We've owned numerous fans and none have had that "feature."

rdoherty• 12 years ago

Do we need to nitpick this article like this? The general statement about how people in South Korea believe in fan death is true.

science404• 12 years ago

Yes, we should. If the general statement about fans is not true, then the general statement about how South Koreans believe in fan death loses validity. The author didn't do their research.

LukeFitzpatrick3• 12 years ago

Hey serialx, I live in SK too, if you ever wanna grab a beer or coffee, shoot me an email: lukejamesfitzpatrick@gmail.com

On Fan Death, the media bought it all up and publicized it on TV, naturally most South Koreans believe it. They are super conscious about anything related to health (even though smoking and binge drinking is quite common here).

If I have a cold, my wife (Korean) will tell me to go to the hospital. I grew up with not taking medicine unless it's absolutely necessary.

Back on topic, It's more of a culturally thing. I wouldn't bother trying to explain to people that it's not real, focus on feeling amused about the cultural difference.

Likwise, I'm from Australia, in my hometown (small beach town), I could walk to the local convenience store wearing no footware, no tshirt - just boxer shorts. To Korean people, they'd think I'm insane..... Just trying to highlight the differences in culture; seeing the humorous side of things is often better than trying to persuade someone they're wrong.

jrs995• 12 years ago

what about in melbourne. would it be normal to walk into a starbucks with no shirt and no shoes?

1_player• 12 years ago

I've seen what I thought were American tourists in Italy going barefoot on the streets. I and everybody else around them thought they are insane.

But yeah, I like to eat horse (and rabbit) meat while I would be looked upon with disgust in most parts of the world :)

thaumasiotes2• 12 years ago

In China, getting an IV of saline solution is considered healthful. People will stop by the hospital for an IV drip even if they aren't sick. Has this infected Korea too?

ddoolin3• 12 years ago

The last bit is so true it hurts. We have numerous shops and other places either in my apartment or right outside and I feel the need to dress up completely just to essentially go downstairs and get some snacks or diapers. I suppose a big reason it doesn't bother me much is that we get enough glances as it is, fully-dressed, so the last thing I want to do is invite more stares.

cafard• 12 years ago

Wait, boxer shorts?

I used to see "No Shirts, No Shoes, No Service" on American stores. But as far as I know, few Americans walk around the streets in what is actually underwear.

tomasien3• 12 years ago

I totally believe you - I probably shouldn't have stated this as fact, it's just how it has been explained to me second hand.

mebassett• 12 years ago

"fan death" is certainly a possible phenomenon. it works similar to a convection oven. The US EPA even warns against fan death, though not calling it that.

http://askakorean.blogspot.co.uk/2009/01/fan-death-is-real.h...

and

http://www.epa.gov/hiri/about/pdf/EHEguide_final.pdf pg43 and appendix B

this comment totally misses the point of the article. but I was sufficiently amused to learn about "real" fan death that I thought it was worth sharing.

giarc• 12 years ago

The TWG also strongly recommends that, as part of a public education program, cities emphasize that portable electric fans are not the simple cooling solution they appear to be. Because of the limits of conduction and convection, using a portable electric fan alone when heat index temperatures exceed 99°f actually increases the heat stress the body must respond to by blowing air that is warmer than the ideal body temperature over the skin surface (American Medical Association Council on Scientific Affairs, 1997; CDC, 2004c). In these conditions, portable electric fans provide a cooling effect by evaporating sweat. The increased circulation of hot air and increased sweat evaporation can, however, speed the onset of heat-attributable conditions (e.g., heat exhaustion).

Appendix B also warns you about the extreme dangers of a fan.

raverbashing• 12 years ago

So, "fans kill" when the temperature can do that all by itself...

Kronopath• 12 years ago

Interesting. So the point is not that the fan can kill you, but that:

1. Being in a completely sealed room when it's very hot outside can kill you,

2. Even though it may make you feel cooler, a fan won't really help in that situation, and

3. It may actually make the problem worse by increasing convection of the air and making it hotter.

I'd argue that calling that "fan death" is misleading, as it's really the heat that's causing the health concerns, not the fan. But it's good to keep in mind these kinds of concerns.

jeremysalwen• 12 years ago

To be fair, the danger is during "Extreme Heat Emergencies". The effect they are referring to is when the external air is hotter than your internal body temperature (98.6), and so the external air heats up rather than cools down the body.

From the temperature records I can find, temperatures that high are a once in a lifetime event in South Korea. On the other hand, you would experience such temperatures regularly in Arizona, for example, but if you're living in Phoenix and are at risk for heat death, I'd hope you have AC.

danohuiginn• 12 years ago

Superstitions about drafts are bizarrely common. Bosnians, for example, tend to be terrified of "propuh", or cross drafts. If you leave windows open on either side of a building, you risk any malady up to and including paralysis.

I find it hard to understand how such beliefs get started, or manage to remain so prevalent.

Retra• 12 years ago

People are absurd.

hobs• 12 years ago

Its very easy to understand how it gets started, its just weird that people hang onto them, and it is the same reason people burned witches.

1. Something uneventful thing happens (a guy likes to leave his windows open) 2. He gets cancer and dies 3. Cross drafts are clearly the problem

Avalaxy• 12 years ago

In The Netherlands (not sure if that's specified to my country or to people in general) I often hear people saying that you shouldn't go outside without a jacket when it's cold, because it will make you sick...

adambard• 12 years ago

This is common in Canada (from experience) and probably the US (from watching American TV).

kalleboo2• 12 years ago

I've heard this in the US, UK, Sweden, Japan... it seems like a universal misconception.

ceejayoz• 12 years ago

That one's actually probably correct. http://www.nature.com/news/cold-viruses-thrive-in-frosty-con...

A team from Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, found that low temperatures dampen natural defences against rhinoviruses, the leading causes of seasonal colds, in mice and in human airway cells.

Alex39172• 12 years ago

Has any actual research been done on this? I don't see why people think it's obviously false.

artie_effim• 12 years ago

Yes - the classic Morbidity Rates of proto-Altaic ( Haplogroup O2b* (P49), Haplogroup D-M174) Due to Mechanically Generated Localized Atmospheric Disruption And Circulation study is a must read.

kalleboo2• 12 years ago

Quoth Wikipedia: "There are no verified cases of the alleged phenomenon"

There's also the fact that this phenomenon has never been observed outside of South Korea. People around the world sleep indoors with fans on every day.

Alex39172• 12 years ago

There are no verified cases of the alleged phenomenon

You could say the same thing for SIDS, but most people in the west accept that it exists.

People around the world sleep indoors with fans on every day.

Then surely some of them must die in their sleep, so it shouldn't be that difficult to do a study.

It's one thing to say that no research has been done to study whether people who sleep under fans are more likely to die in their sleep, or to say that the South Korean belief is unjustified given the lack of evidence, but to say that it's 'obviously false' strikes me as being a little bit racially tinged.

kylebgorman• 12 years ago

For something to not be "obviously false", I expect an intuitive mechanistic just-so story. So, how could fans, operating within standard tolerances, in closed rooms, possibly cause deaths?

There is probably a just-so story that meets this standard, but none has occurred to me.

FiReaNG3L• 12 years ago

I always thought it was to leave their society a way to honorably explain suicides?

function_seven• 12 years ago

I thought that, too. But how can it be honorable to fall asleep with the fan still running? If that's a deadly thing to do, then it seems like that would be the same as idling your car in a closed garage: still suicide.

pavel_lishin2• 12 years ago

I thought that the belief was that running a fan all night was dangerous, not guaranteed to kill. So in that sense, it would be more like getting drunk and being hit by a train - not exactly a smart move, but possibly a better alternative than suicide.

tartuffe78• 12 years ago

I've heard fan death is cited in cases where suicide or overdose is the true cause, and families don't want to admit it to themselves or others.

peeters• 12 years ago

I had thought the same. And if true the author is mistaken; believing in it (or rather propagating it) does offer something in return.

KeytarHero• 12 years ago

I've also heard it was propagated by the Korean government so people would save electricity from not running their fans or air conditioners all night in the summer.

The Wikipedia article does have a citation from 1927 [1], though, so it would seem the origins are much older than that.

My guess is it's a bit of all of the above. Maybe there was a little bit of belief in it, and the government, but government efforts to reduce energy usage as well as families using it to cover up suicide or drug overdoses helped propagate the belief and make it far more widespread.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_death#cite_ref-2

andrey-p2• 12 years ago

Ah, good old ingrained gut knowledge. I know a bit about that.

I'm an ex-pat from an Eastern European country, currently living in the UK. Where I come from, there is a subcurrent of racism that pretty much everyone has. I've heard all the standard ones: "[ethnic group]? You know what they're like" and "[religious group] are all [stereotype]. Oh, [a good acquaintance who is the only member of said religious group this person knows]? He's all right, yeah, but he's an exception."[1]

These come in the form of gut feelings that you somehow know are true, and when you're presented with evidence to the contrary you just assume it's an exception to the rule. Even if you objectively know these gut feelings are incorrect, they're still hard to dispel because they're so deeply ingrained. It's stuff that's taken me a while to shake off.

What I'm trying to say is: challenge your gut responses to stuff. It'll make you a better person.

[1]: These are almost verbatim quotes from people who are otherwise fairly open-minded and progressive.

gregwtmtno• 12 years ago

It's funny that you're assuming that these people's statements are the exception to the rule and they're otherwise fairly open-minded and progressive. It seems like you're being presented with evidence to the contrary.

pc862• 12 years ago

Presumably the word "otherwise" means if you disregard those closed-minded and non-progressive facets.

andrey-p2• 12 years ago

I'm talking about people I've known since before I was 10, so I can say I know them pretty well.

Edit: And don't even get me started about the ones who aren't progressive and open minded.

ch8230• 12 years ago

'what else have we been convinced to give up without getting anything in return?' My time to read this article for one.

serve_yay• 12 years ago

I know fan death isn’t real, it’s ridiculous of course…… but you know it does happen sometimes right?
cultural mythos is so powerful that it can make people believe things they know to be untrue without even offering them anything in return.

The situation is even worse, unfortunately. This is called fetishistic disavowal: "I know very well, but...". Not only does it take the form of protecting obviously false beliefs (as with fan death), but it can also function as a way of disavowing what we know to be true.

Many of us know the world is facing a set of worsening crises (environmental/social/economic) but continue to live our lives as if this is not the case. I don't mean those who, for example, dispute the truth of global warming, I am speaking of those who know very well it is true but do not do anything.

The philosopher Slavoj Zizek often repeats a story about the astrophysicist Niels Bohr. While a friend was visiting Bohr's country home, they asked why a horseshoe was placed above a doorway, a common good-luck superstition practiced in Europe and elsewhere. Bohr's reply: "of course I don't believe it works, but I was told that it works even if you don't believe in it." Many beliefs in modern times work in this way.

happyscrappy• 12 years ago

I am speaking of those who know very well it is true but do not do anything.

I assume you have some cure that isn't worse than the disease.

thaumasiotes2• 12 years ago

http://komplexify.com/math/humor_pure/UrbanLegends.html

[Paul Adrien Maurice] Dirac had a horse shoe over his desk. One day a student asked if he really believed that a horse shoe brought luck. Professor Dirac replied, "I understand that it brings you luck if you believe in it or not."

further reading: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/10/09/horseshoe-luck/

doodpants• 12 years ago

The claim that something "works whether you believe in it or not" is not necessarily a sign that it is a superstition. After all, things that are objectively true have this property. For example, technologies developed as a result of true scientific discovery work whether or not you believe in them. If something is claimed to work only if you believe it, that is the sign of a superstition.

tootie• 12 years ago

I know Korean guy who has a PhD in Biology and believes in fan death. The minds ability to delude itself is amazing.

dsugarman• 12 years ago

However, buying into a myth created by the culture to which you belong apparently doesn’t require extra incentive.

The extra incentive is that you don't die. You don't have to believe the myth to do a cost analysis in your head. Many people who don't believe in god will turn to god in dire situations.

thekylemontag• 12 years ago

Fan death is one of the funniest case studies of companies creating hysteria in order to sell more units.

Once everyone has a fan, how do you get people to buy more fans? Make them think their current fans will kill them, and sell more expensive fans with improved ‘safety’ features.

Well played Korea, well played.

scrollaway3• 12 years ago

You got any actual sources to back up this conspiracy theory?

doki_pen• 12 years ago

There is obviously no such thing is ghosts. But I challenge you to go into a spooky old house at night with no lights and not be scared of ghosts.

moron4hire• 12 years ago

I'd be more scared of tripping over creaky floorboards. When I was a teenager, we briefly lived in a 200 year old house. The floorboards in the upstairs bedrooms bent when you stepped on them. I was convinced they were going to snap in half and we'd fall through the floor, probably cutting an artery in the groin, bleeding out in minutes. I could hardly sleep at night, afraid the bed was going to fall through the floor.

No, the unexplained lights in the hall at night were nothing in comparison.

scrollaway3• 12 years ago

It's odd how being scared of something makes you believe that everyone is scared of it.

There's a significant amount of people who don't actually get scared of "spooky old houses". Just like there's some people who don't get nervous when a giant spider is on their hand. Or when they're talking to a crowd. Or when they're on top of a cliff.

I'd certainly be nervous in a "spooky old house" but certainly not for its ghosts. I do despise spiders for one thing.

jrs995• 12 years ago

you make a good point. And I also certainly would not be afraid of ghosts in an old house. I would be afraid of the unknown and unfamiliar places.

but at the same time, what is interesting to me, is that most of us can get scared by horror films or movies about ghosts. so if you get scared by a ghost in a movie, could that mean you believe, at least for a moment, in ghosts? or would it simply mean that IF ghosts existed, you would be afraid of them.

josu• 12 years ago

There is a pretty popular expression in Galicia (Spain)that sums up this perfectly:

"Eu non creo nas meigas, mais habelas, hainas"

Which roughly translates to: I don't believe in witches, but they are out there

jdarrow• 12 years ago

Holy sheep shit batman. This story freaks me out. I did not know this was a wide spread thing in Korea.

I had an argument with my wife about this subject years ago. She is from S. Korea and I am from the US. She had yelled at me because I left a fan on and fell asleep. When she got home from work and realized what happened she freaked out and told me I could die that way. At the time I remember thinking that she was absolutely crazy to believe this was possible. We argued for a long time about it and at the time I remember questioning her sanity, repeatedly. Eventually she dropped it and admitted it probably was wrong of her.

Every once in a while this strange superstitious stuff pops up with her. I love her deeply but it is not easy being married to a South Korean. :-)

jrs995• 12 years ago

I feel for you. As a Mormon who has been on missions to Korea, I can without a doubt say they are the most gullible people on the planet. They believe in some crazy stuff.

knodi123• 12 years ago

help... choking... irony... too thick...

pavel_lishin2• 12 years ago

This questions is probably going to come off as sounding kind of tongue-in-cheek, but I gotta ask: does that make your job easier? Does their 'gullibility' mean that they're more open to new ideas (which would presumably make things easier for you), or just that their current set of beliefs seems crazy to you?

noarchy• 12 years ago

I feel for you. As a Mormon who has been on missions to Korea, I can without a doubt say they are the most gullible people on the planet. They believe in some crazy stuff.

"My superstition isn't crazy, but theirs is."

dragonwriter• 12 years ago

As a Mormon who has been on missions to Korea, I can without a doubt say they are the most gullible people on the planet.

Wouldn't you need to have not only been to Korea, but also everywhere else (at least, all the populated places) on the planet to justifiably say that "without a doubt"?

cheshire137• 12 years ago

As a Mormon
they are the most gullible people

wat.

slayed0• 12 years ago

I this a serious comment? It's legitimately hard to tell.

lukasm• 12 years ago

Due to cultural shame of suicide they choose to blame fans as a cause rather than autoerotic asphyxiation.

marine7• 12 years ago

This is one of my favorite phenomena because it underscores a basic human emotion: being 100% confident that something is not true, yet simultaneously unable to escape the feeling that is can’t be completely untrue.

This sounds a lot like my OCD. I'm an atheist, I don't believe in a "higher power." And yet, I feel compelled to do certain things a certain number of times all because well, "it can't hurt, and just in case." I wish I could explain it better but that article is exactly how I feel about my OCD.

benmarks• 12 years ago

Curiosities of human/social behavior such as this amaze me until I think about all the people across multiple cultures who feel compelled to respond in some manner when someone sneezes.

donpark• 12 years ago

Fan death is not really belief but more healthy respect for the Unknown and avoiding unnecessary risk.

danbolt• 12 years ago

I was thinking similar thoughts about this when reading the article!

Or, part of me thinks that while you know it doesn't make sense, you don't lose anything by being careful about the fan. I think the people in Korea mentioned here are playing Pascal's Wager but with household electronics.

yongjik3• 12 years ago

Most younger generation Koreans probably don't believe in it any more. I've seen the myth discussed several times (including at least one newspaper article).

Korea is a very well connected country: some of us do read the English wikipedia.

Also, I kinda like timers in electric fans (though it's been years since I used one): there's no need to blow wind when you're asleep. Sure you wouldn't die, but you might catch cold or find yourself awake at 4 am because your limbs are uncomfortably cold.

(My parents probably still believe in fan death, though.)

Finally, as someone below said, "you can’t even buy a fan that will run all night." is patently false. Every fan I can remember has a "run indefinitely" position.

tomasien3• 12 years ago

Still weird that they even have a "run indefinitely" position but I totally believe you. I was just reporting what I've heard second hand.

mhurron2• 12 years ago

you might catch cold

No more than leaving rags laying around will give you an infestation of mice.

there's no need to blow wind when you're asleep

Except to keep the room at a comfortable temperature.

yongjik3• 12 years ago

Well, I hope you know that a fan cannot lower room temperature...

theseoafs2• 12 years ago

Is the treatment of the topic of Fan Death significantly different on the Korean language Wikipedia?

yongjik3• 12 years ago

I just skimmed through it; it contains too many "weasel words", making it sound like something still controversial. :(

I guess a few people still believes the myth and likes to keep the page that way. (Korean wikipedia has much smaller community behind it, so it's easier to exert editorial influence if someone is committed. At least that was my impression several years ago.)

tomasien3• 12 years ago

I feel like there's a small misunderstanding here: I'm not criticizing Koreans here. I'm sure their understanding of this is more nuanced than I'm describing from second hand accounts. I just think it makes an interesting parallel.

jrs995• 12 years ago

Well if, like you say, all koreans believe that a fan "chops up" air molecules (maybe they all believe the blades of fans chop up CO2 into CO) then they really need to be criticized. I agree with you that its an absolute shock that they believe this. It is definitely one of the crazier beliefs a modernized population can have, and I admit that I believe a staff can be turned into a snake.

gear54rus• 12 years ago

Even believing in ghosts or vampires offers the chance to escape into a reality where anything is possible, even if that reality is terrifying. Fan Death, however, doesn’t offer anything.

Doesn't it have more to do with better safe than sorry human mentality? You barely think about something positive when staring at a completely dark hallway and your brain starts to draw you scary pictures.

harryjo• 12 years ago

Ask a Korean wrote a few articles on this, the most authoritative on the Internet. (Don't be put off by the URL) http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2009/01/fan-death-is-real.htm...

spacehome• 12 years ago

It's not as though the URL inaccurately describes his position. After a lot of talk about pseudo-science, that's his position.

nemonemo• 12 years ago

I am from South Korea, and I know this fan death thing could seem superstitious, but as another comment pointed out, it is a cautious approach toward unknowns, in addition to mass version of confirmation bias. (News reports a death with a fan on -- oh, that scary scythe of the fan..)

But who knows? There could have been a death that could have been prevented by turning off a fan, and nobody can verify its nonexistence. My attitude toward this is like my agnostic attitude toward God: I just can't know its existence or nonexistence. And I think what the people in the article are expressing can be understood in a similar line (though 100% is an overstatement.)

Still I sometimes argue with Koreans with relatively less background in scientific thinking about scientific things like if fan deaths are possible, or using metal spoons for yogurts kill more microbes than plastic spoons, etc, but many times, my conclusion is that I just can't have any conviction about either ways.

dubfan• 12 years ago

Does anyone else find it strange that the author uses an article that uncritically repeats the Rolling Stone UVA rape hoax as an example of dispelling myths? Doublethink indeed.

Korean Fan Death

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