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Time needs some sanity!

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Gillian Densmore

Time needs some sanity!

for your consumption:

http://nation.time.com/2013/11/01/daylight-savings-time-time-explains/

or time article on day light savings

and the nice moveon.org link get fid of this f'n time change!

Personally: I vote for a time equivalent of the metric system. Considering moving from days of the week labeled as monday-thursday and just as numbers, same for months of the year.

I also vote for a Zombie Apocalypse.

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Steve Smith

Re: Time needs some sanity!

Gil -

Personally: I vote for a time equivalent of the metric system. Considering moving from days of the week labeled as monday-thursday and just as numbers, same for months of the year.

There are situations where we use daily cycles and annual cycles as the only measure (100 days into the Presidency, or Tax Freedom Day) but as the neo-retro luddite that I am, I would like my calender *more*, not less registered on solar and lunar cycles. But the beat frequency between diurnal, synodic, sidereal, tropical cycles aren't convenient multiples. Weeks (1/4 moons), months (moons), years, are sort of a closest fit to something universally observable, not requiring coordination, just observation.

I *am* surprised that time is the last bastion of ancient standards and calculations and the sexagesimal system. 10 offers 2 and 5 as prime factors, 60 offers 2, 3, 5 ... not a lot more, but maybe enough to make ad-hoc fractions much easier. If we wanted to add 7 or even 11 into it, we'd be up in the 210 and 2310 base range... perhaps a bit too much for any but the savants among us?

Given that days and years have some reasonable correlation with 1/4 fractions (daybreak, noon, sundown, midnight, winter, spring, summer, autumn) I can live with a 12 month year and a 24 hour day than say... 10 monthlets of 10 weeklets of 3.65 days and 10 HOURs roughly 2.4 of our current hours long.. .or 100 hourlets of 16 minutes long...

Just wait until we inhabit other planets/stars... our notion of "standard time" will go to hell (even more completely).

Meanwhile, I vote to not bother changing our clocks... stay on "standard time". And while we are at it, let's not be too hasty about declaring Pi to be equal to 3 just because it is easier to use.

I also vote for a Zombie Apocalypse.

I think I could pass on the flesh eating former-family-members-you-have-to-coldly-chop-to-little-pieces-cuz-they-are-undead part, but I *am* still drawn (vaguely) by the presumed simplicity of a post-apocalyptic world.

It's an illusion, I know, but there is still that imagination that a primitive, dog-eat-dog (or zombie-eat-human) world would make every moment a richer experience with less equivocation... but I think tradeoff is a bad one in the bottom line.

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Parks, Raymond

Re: [EXTERNAL] Re: Time needs some sanity!

That system is essentially what was used in France during their Revolution.

From: Steve Smith [mailto:[hidden email]]
Sent: Sunday, November 03, 2013 10:28 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [FRIAM] Time needs some sanity!

Gil -

Personally: I vote for a time equivalent of the metric system. Considering moving from days of the week labeled as monday-thursday and just as numbers, same for months of the year.

I also vote for a Zombie Apocalypse.

Arlo Barnes

Re: Time needs some sanity!

In reply to this post by Steve Smith

Neo-retro luddite that I am, I would like my calender *more*, not less registered on solar and lunar cycles.

Meanwhile, I vote to not bother changing our clocks... stay on "standard time". And while we are at it, let's not be too hasty about declaring Pi to be equal to 3 just because it is easier to use.

I have given my recommendation (last clock change) for what we as a world should do. Rather than rehashing it I shall note that, as a non-farmer (and someone who does not often keep recommendable sleep schedules, but that is another story) the conventional calendar, complete with hms timekeeping system, offers no immediately discernible advantage over an arbitrary alternative system, apart from compatibility with the rest of the world. And if that is the goal of the US, they should write their dates in an order that makes sense (an ISO-approved one, maybe?), use a 24-hour clock (of course, that would ruin FriAM's name, it would have to be Fri<12) and why not fully switch to metric (SI, actually) while they are at it (besides street signs and odometers [and some speedometers], we are making progress: SFCC's physics lab has metric floor tiles now).
Also, there is the old joke about an engineer approximating pi to 3 (his companions are a physicist and a mathematician); it turns out ten places are enough to measure the circumference of the earth (given the radius of the earth; let us say you get it in exact earth-radius-units [one of them, then] for preciseness) to within an inch. So maybe 3 is easier except for edge cases?

I think I could pass on the flesh eating former-family-members-you-have-to-coldly-chop-to-little-pieces-cuz-they-are-undead part, but I *am* still drawn (vaguely) by the presumed simplicity of a post-apocalyptic world.

It's an illusion, I know, but there is still that imagination that a primitive, dog-eat-dog (or zombie-eat-human) world would make every moment a richer experience with less equivocation... but I think tradeoff is a bad one in the bottom line.

I am about halfway through World War Z (the book) and it is an excellent global, cross-career oral history (and thereby analysis) of how the world reacts to a combined huge natural disaster and war. How do they react? Not well.
-Arlo James Barnes

Steve Smith

Re: Time needs some sanity!

Arlo -

I applaud your attempts at brevity... I shall take note.

I have given my recommendation (last clock change) for what we as a world should do. Rather than rehashing it I shall note that, as a non-farmer (and someone who does not often keep recommendable sleep schedules, but that is another story) the conventional calendar, complete with hms timekeeping system, offers no immediately discernible advantage over an arbitrary alternative system, apart from compatibility with the rest of the world.

Come the Apocalypse you will probably wish you were a farmer ;)

Also, there is the old joke about an engineer approximating pi to 3 (his companions are a physicist and a mathematician); it turns out ten places are enough to measure the circumference of the earth (given the radius of the earth; let us say you get it in exact earth-radius-units [one of them, then] for preciseness) to within an inch. So maybe 3 is easier except for edge cases?

I use "three and a smidge" all the time... but then I'm also a cut-thrice measure twice kinda guy too. You don't want me doing your finish carpentry.

I am about halfway through World War Z (the book) and it is an excellent global, cross-career oral history (and thereby analysis) of how the world reacts to a combined huge natural disaster and war. How do they react? Not well.

Yes, but that is what fuels evolution is it not? Huge numbers of failures and a very very few successes?

- Steve

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Arlo Barnes

Re: Time needs some sanity!

Come the Apocalypse you will probably wish you were a farmer ;)
Yes, but that is what fuels evolution is it not? Huge numbers of failures and a very very few successes?

Well, the US government is a lot more likable during the war. They have a career retraining program to teach office workers practical skills, as revealed by a guy interviewed in Taos.
-Arlo James Barnes

Parks, Raymond

Re: [EXTERNAL] Re: Time needs some sanity!

In reply to this post by Parks, Raymond

Now that I'm back at my desk, I refer you to the French Republican Calendar - here's an article on wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Republican_Calendar

TL;DR - 100 seconds = 1 minute, 100 minutes = 1 hour, 10 hours = 1 day, 10 days = a week (French décade), 3 weeks in a month, and twelve months in a year. That adds up to 360 so the five or six days to approximate the solar year were added at the end of the year. Every fourth year was when six days were added. The years started with the autumnal equinox (roughly 23 September). The months were given new names base on nature.

The wikipedia article has a conversion table that tells me as I write this it is 9:81:55 of Primidi, decade 6, of Brumaire in Paris.

Ray Parks

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On Nov 3, 2013, at 1:22 PM, Parks, Raymond wrote:

That system is essentially what was used in France during their Revolution.

From: Steve Smith [mailto:[hidden email]]
Sent: Sunday, November 03, 2013 10:28 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [FRIAM] Time needs some sanity!

Gil -

Personally: I vote for a time equivalent of the metric system. Considering moving from days of the week labeled as monday-thursday and just as numbers, same for months of the year.

There are situations where we use daily cycles and annual cycles as the only measure (100 days into the Presidency, or Tax Freedom Day) but as the neo-retro luddite that I am, I would like my calender *more*, not less registered on solar and lunar cycles. But the beat frequency between diurnal, synodic, sidereal, tropical cycles aren't convenient multiples. Weeks (1/4 moons), months (moons), years, are sort of a closest fit to something universally observable, not requiring coordination, just observation.

I *am* surprised that time is the last bastion of ancient standards and calculations and the sexagesimal system. 10 offers 2 and 5 as prime factors, 60 offers 2, 3, 5 ... not a lot more, but maybe enough to make ad-hoc fractions much easier. If we wanted to add 7 or even 11 into it, we'd be up in the 210 and 2310 base range... perhaps a bit too much for any but the savants among us?

Given that days and years have some reasonable correlation with 1/4 fractions (daybreak, noon, sundown, midnight, winter, spring, summer, autumn) I can live with a 12 month year and a 24 hour day than say... 10 monthlets of 10 weeklets of 3.65 days and 10 HOURs roughly 2.4 of our current hours long.. .or 100 hourlets of 16 minutes long...

Just wait until we inhabit other planets/stars... our notion of "standard time" will go to hell (even more completely).

Meanwhile, I vote to not bother changing our clocks... stay on "standard time". And while we are at it, let's not be too hasty about declaring Pi to be equal to 3 just because it is easier to use.

I also vote for a Zombie Apocalypse.

I think I could pass on the flesh eating former-family-members-you-have-to-coldly-chop-to-little-pieces-cuz-they-are-undead part, but I *am* still drawn (vaguely) by the presumed simplicity of a post-apocalyptic world.

It's an illusion, I know, but there is still that imagination that a primitive, dog-eat-dog (or zombie-eat-human) world would make every moment a richer experience with less equivocation... but I think tradeoff is a bad one in the bottom line.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

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Steve Smith

Re: [EXTERNAL] Re: Time needs some sanity!

Ray -

Now that I'm back at my desk, I refer you to the French Republican Calendar - here's an article on wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Republican_Calendar

Nicely found... when offered in the abstract it didn't appeal to me, but when presented as a real, specific example, which (some) people adopted in real life if only for less than a decade, it is easier to take seriously.

TL;DR - 100 seconds = 1 minute, 100 minutes = 1 hour, 10 hours = 1 day, 10 days = a week (French décade), 3 weeks in a month, and twelve months in a year. That adds up to 360 so the five or six days to approximate the solar year were added at the end of the year. Every fourth year was when six days were added. The years started with the autumnal equinox (roughly 23 September). The months were given new names base on nature.