where to direct my fan
 

This seems like a light subject compared to the others here involving things such as Einstein's theory of relativity and... other math things, but:

There is a debate where I live that, in attempting to cool off the house, pointing the big fan so it blows cool air from the outside to the inside is more effective than pointing it the other direction so all the warm air blows OUT of the house.

What do you think? The cooling effect of being directly in the path of the fan is minimized by the fact that the fan is not immediately near the living quarters.

Thanks!

Well, I'm interested to hear what other people think, but it seems like it depends on how warm it is outside. If it's quite warm, you probably just want to blow air out. If it's cooler, blow warm air in. But perhaps the best way is to set up two fans, one blowing in and one blowing out, so that you have a nice cross breeze.

Thanks for response. Yeah, I should have been more detailed. It is pretty warm outside. I think the house is generally a little bit cooler than it is outside. Cross breeze sounds lovely, but... unfortunately, only one fan. We have these huge windows in the living room which do not open, so we have the back door open to place the fan near.

I am kicking myself for selling my ac to my brother a couple years ago... I was in an apartment with central air, so I thought "don't need this anymore!" Stupid stupid me. And it's only the beginning of May, damn.

Yea i was gonna suggest the same thing. Put one fan on one end of the house blowing in, and one on the other end blowing out. That way the entire area has air circulating around, and that will help cool everything off.

You could just pick up an air conditioner too :D

If you have 2 floors, open the windows on the second floor, then leave the back door open. Or if 1 floor open the top part of the windows (if possible) to let the warmer air out. Really just gotta get the air moving around once you have something open.

It seems to me that if it is hotter outside you might want to just close the windows and circulate the air inside. Otherwise as soon as the temp inside and the temp outside equalize you won't really be cooling anything off, just recirculating the air.

Otherwise, like obie said, blow out the hotter air, suck in the cooler air.

Well, I used to live in a house with a huge ass attic fan, which only went one direction, and my opinion is it doesn't matter much just as long as there is air circulating round the house.

If it's cooler outside than in, it seems like the fan should be blowing into the house, and the reverse if it's hotter outside than in, however, I believe it doesn't matter much what direction the wind is blowing as long as the wind is blowing or at least that's how it seems to me.

What I do is run the air conditioner. No, seriously, if your house is situated anything like mine , I get sun out back in the morning and out front in the evening. So it is much cooler in the front in the morning so I draw air in from a front window in the A.M. and reverse it in the evening.