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by moultano·4y ago·view on hn ↗
You'll notice CO2 levels at 1000 ppm. The air will feel "stuffy," you'll feel lethargic, and feel like going outside. This is the primary reason why meetings at work are so stultifying. There's just too much CO2 in the room for anyone to think clearly. Just carry a CO2 meter around and measure it yourself. Once you're aware of it, the feeling is impossible to miss.
2 comments
If the CO2 level of the atmosphere doubles, we are still going to have bigger problems to solve.

> Just carry a CO2 meter around and measure it yourself. Once you're aware of it, the feeling is impossible to miss.

Sounds like a combination of confirmation bias and psychosomatic placebo effect to me. Plus you’re assuming a specific correlation between subjective minor discomfort and cognitive performance.

I would posit that the level of CO2 you need to cause detectable society wide problems is probably lower than the level that makes a room actively uncomfortable to be in.

There's a reason why we already have universal colloquial language to describe a room with too much CO2, "stuffy," "getting some fresh air to clear your head." We all know this stuff intuitively, we've experienced it directly our whole lives.

You can posit whatever you like, but I don't see any evidence.

Edit to reply to ninja edit:

> There's a reason why we already have universal colloquial language to describe a room with too much CO2, "stuffy" "getting some fresh air to clear your head." We all know this stuff intuitively, we've experienced it directly our whole lives.

First off, you're going back to the perception of minor discomfort to defend the claim that CO2 levels that aren't even high enough to cause minor discomfort are high enough to cause "detectable society wide problems". This strikes me as incoherent and evasive. Secondly, you're assuming that the minor discomfort of being in a "stuffy" room is entirely caused by CO2 concentration. (In my personal experience, body and food odors are the main sources of discomfort when I'm in a poorly ventilated space.) And thirdly, you're assuming that this discomfort necessarily causes poor cognitive performance.

CO2 will be elevated in a stuffy room, but that's not actually what you're noticing. It's humidity and VOCs.

If CO2 was actually high enough to be a problem, the first symptoms would be an increase in heart rate and rate of respiration. Kinda the opposite of lethargy.

No, it really isn't. Plant conservatories never feel stuffy even though the humidity is high, and the same room with fewer people in it doesn't feel stuffy either.