If I cut my heat when it's 14 out, my house does not drop to below freezing in 6 hours, or become uninhabitable in 24 hours. What the hell are they on?

None of this was forgotten. If they extended their study to a month's worth of -20F, all of that mass will cease looking so attractive. It will work well if all you care about is keeping your house above freezing but most do not consider that livable.

Absurd open. Are they just going to assume we were supposed to build 150 million homes in 250 years as a string of log cabins? Dismiss all the new engineering material changes since the 1500s and choose hardwood for everything?

Body heat of farm animals was how people in my country got through the winter but that comes with it's own problems.