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You're all fools! All you need is a good stick and the sun's light and you can tell the time of day! Wasting 30 dollars on a watch! Joking aside, there are peo

by moate 8y ago

You're all fools! All you need is a good stick and the sun's light and you can tell the time of day! Wasting 30 dollars on a watch! Joking aside, there are people who refuse to ascribe anything BUT utilitarian value to things as a sort of anti-consumerist view. Going to be hard to convert them.

TheOtherHobbes 8y ago
Expensive mechanical watches don't work very well. For all the marketing written about craftsmanship and history and so on, the harsh truth is that they're not nearly as good as keeping time as a cheap digital watch with a quartz crystal. (Casios are rated between and 1 and 0.5 secs/day, while a Rolex Chronometer is rated to 2 secs/day. High end quartz watches that cost thousands can be rated to 5 secs/yr. Of course a phone that supports NTP on a network should be at least as accurate as that.) So the only reason for buying an expensive watch is to signal that you can afford an expensive watch. And if you're going to do that, you might as well have a piece of solid gold surgically implanted in your forehead. If that's ridiculous - and it is - why is it any more ridiculous than spending tens or hundreds of thousands buying a watch that may well be ugly, inelegant, bulky, or even vulgar, and isn't even outstandingly good at being a watch?
- Fins 8y ago
  Does 2 seconds a day vs. 1 second a day really matter to you, or most people? There certainly is signaling for many people's purchases of high-end watches (moreso with Rolexes which are easily recognizable compared to some "better" or more expensive brands... Pateks generally are quite understated) but some people appreciate the esthetics, or the intricacy of the mechanics. And really, if you do have money, is it really different from collecting stamps (even less utilitarian value, generally) or classic cars (yeah, you can get from point A to point B, but with far less comfort and safety than in a modern econobox) or anything else? Not everything in the world is about purely utilitarian value.
- moate 8y ago
  It's jewelry. Earrings serve even less function than a watch, and can cost even more. shrugs Gotta find something to spend that money on?
saalweachter 8y ago
What, you need a stick? :-) (In all seriousness, one of the most common ways I check the time, besides my phone unlock screen, is checking how much sunlight I have left by the "1 hand above the horizon = 1 hour" method.)

by moate 8y ago

TheOtherHobbes 8y ago

Expensive mechanical watches don't work very well. For all the marketing written about craftsmanship and history and so on, the harsh truth is that they're not nearly as good as keeping time as a cheap digital watch with a quartz crystal. (Casios are rated between and 1 and 0.5 secs/day, while a Rolex Chronometer is rated to 2 secs/day. High end quartz watches that cost thousands can be rated to 5 secs/yr. Of course a phone that supports NTP on a network should be at least as accurate as that.) So the only reason for buying an expensive watch is to signal that you can afford an expensive watch. And if you're going to do that, you might as well have a piece of solid gold surgically implanted in your forehead. If that's ridiculous - and it is - why is it any more ridiculous than spending tens or hundreds of thousands buying a watch that may well be ugly, inelegant, bulky, or even vulgar, and isn't even outstandingly good at being a watch?

Fins 8y ago
Does 2 seconds a day vs. 1 second a day really matter to you, or most people? There certainly is signaling for many people's purchases of high-end watches (moreso with Rolexes which are easily recognizable compared to some "better" or more expensive brands... Pateks generally are quite understated) but some people appreciate the esthetics, or the intricacy of the mechanics. And really, if you do have money, is it really different from collecting stamps (even less utilitarian value, generally) or classic cars (yeah, you can get from point A to point B, but with far less comfort and safety than in a modern econobox) or anything else? Not everything in the world is about purely utilitarian value.
moate 8y ago
It's jewelry. Earrings serve even less function than a watch, and can cost even more. shrugs Gotta find something to spend that money on?

saalweachter 8y ago

What, you need a stick? :-) (In all seriousness, one of the most common ways I check the time, besides my phone unlock screen, is checking how much sunlight I have left by the "1 hand above the horizon = 1 hour" method.)