OK, I'm totally confused. It's consistently the hottest place on earth but no temp on earth. How can that be? Either it's on earth or it's not. If it's in a desert, even below it, then it's still on earth. Even the core of the planet is still on earth. Below the surface but still on earth, therefore the temp would still be on earth. Yup, very confused. I suspect this may be a case of semantics.