16 ms·
I am in favor of permanent standard time, but failing that, I am super happy with permanent daylight-saving time. Far more important to me is ridding ourselves
by bhauer 5y ago
I am in favor of permanent standard time, but failing that, I am super happy with permanent daylight-saving time.
Far more important to me is ridding ourselves of the twice-annual insanity of changing clocks. I'd be okay with adopting UTC if that meant our clocks never changed again.
- bayindirh 5y agoI'm reporting from a permanent DST country, and let me tell you something. You'll probably leave your home at dark in the morning and will return again at dark. Waking before light is very demanding for some people's bodies. I can't sleep past beyond 9AM, but waking up at night is a big no no for my body. I can't wake up, I can't function, and it creates all kinds of adverse effects. Health is more important than changing clocks two times a year. No, I'm not simply dreading waking up before sunrise. My body can't function until sunrise regardless of the number of hours I sleep. It's built like that. You might not be suffering like me, but I'm not the only one. Half of our office comes in half-asleep during winter hours. And no, sunrise clocks doesn't work for me.
- michaelt 5y agoCould I recommend a sunrise clock? It's like an alarm clock, but with a built in light it gradually turns on over the course of 30 minutes or so, simulating the rising of the sun.
- bayindirh 5y agoArtificial light doesn't work for me, unfortunately. I immediately wake up when the sun shows its light, regardless of presence of artificial light. I'm built like that, everyone to their own.
- sirmarksalot 5y agoSo I recognize that everyone's trying to give you advice and you didn't ask for it, so I'll just say this one thing and then I'll shut up. They sell things called "full-spectrum" lightbulbs that actually do a pretty good job of standing in for the sun. They're expensive, and use a ton of electricity, but people who've struggled with seasonal affective disorder swear by them.
- jwiz 5y agoThere were a few threads on HN recently along the lines of "you know, it's not 'full-spectrum' light that you need, it's 'enough' light." And then a bunch of links to high power LED lighting. I did buy some. They are bright.
- joconde 5y ago> You'll probably leave your home at dark in the morning and will return again at dark. That's what happened in my high school years in France, which still changes clocks twice a year. Wake up in complete night, take the bus and wait for classes to start under yellow lightbulbs, then go out in the sun for the first time in the day at noon. I don't understand why people are afraid that this will bring what was already happening.
- anonporridge 5y agoAmericans might not realize that most of France is further North than the state of Maine. Paris is further North than Seattle. Scotland and Denmark are near the same latitude as Juneau Alaska. edit; nifty visualization, https://www.bytemuse.com/post/interactive-equivalent-latitude-map/ https://www.bytemuse.com/post/interactive-equivalent-latitud...
- y4mi 5y ago> You'll probably leave your home at dark in the morning and will return again at dark. i live in a country with daylight saving and that happens anyway for a quiet long time each year.
- bayindirh 5y agoAre you leaving at dusk, or at complete darkness? I'm talking about the latter. Leaving at dusk/sunrise is nice and enjoyable. Complete darkness throws my whole body off metabolically.
- walnutclosefarm 5y agoFor many years in Minnesota, I arrived at work in the dark, and left in the dark, from roughly mid-November to late January. And that was in Minnesota. Most of Europe is North of Minneapolis. When I worked in Paris, I walked to and from the office in the dark for many weeks of the winter.
- bayindirh 5y agoI'm somewhere between Iowa and Missouri latitude wise. As I stated elsewhere, it's more about my metabolism, and the DST keeping me at the same side of the sunrise all year long. Permanent DST throws me just before sunrise (aka the darkest hour) which wreaks havoc in my body. I'm aware not everybody is affected this adversely, but mine is affected since forever. It doesn't have a switch for that, sorry.
- joshjdr 5y agoI’m not sure I follow… are you a plant? Regardless +1 UTC or permanent anything… I believe I can adjust my schedule for my needs more easily than trying to fix everyone else’s.
- bayindirh 5y agoIn a sense, yes. I'm a plant. I need to have at least some light to function properly when I open my eye.. sorry stomata. As a plant which is participating to many international meetings regularly (including a one which spans from USA to Japan with everything in between), I think I know a thing or two about scheduling. However, thanks for sharing your valuable insight.
- simonh 5y agoWhere do you live that a one hour shift makes any material difference? Where I am the time of sunset shifts by more about 4 hours. DST is an annoying band aid half arsed effort of a non solution.
- bayindirh 5y agoTurkey. Normal shift is around 2.5 - 3 hours, however where I live, changing clocks means you either wake up late sunrise/morning in the summer or just at sunrise in the winter. Permanent DST throws you to 15 to 40 mins before sunrise in the winter, it's the hardest time frame for my body to wake up. So, with changing clocks, I can always see my surroundings all year long, and with permanent DST, I have to use headlights for ~3 months to be able to drive. It's drastic, and it affects my metabolism badly.
- runarberg 5y agoThe question is not only “must I ever wake up before sunrise?” but also “for how long must I wake up before sunrise?” I grew up in a permanent DST north of 60° and there is always gonna be a time when most people are up and about an hour or more before sunrise. However it doesn’t have to such a large part of the winter. This period could be shortened by a few weeks if the government decided to move back to standard (which incidentally most people support—along with most public health experts—but the government doesn’t).
- eftychis 5y agoPeople living closer to the poles support that. People closer to the equator want longer daylight savings. It's that simple. Honestly we should just understand that it's OK if not everyone is awake at the same time.
- rocqua 5y agoI want permanent standard. My friend who lives a kilometer north of me wants permanent daylight savings. This is at 53 degrees latitude.
- worthless-trash 5y agoIt seems like your permanent DST doesn't do any daylight savings at all, since you aint seeing it. I come from a permanent NON DST zone and love it.
- lurquer 5y ago> No, I'm not simply dreading waking up before sunrise. My body can't function until sunrise regardless of the number of hours I sleep. It's built like that. Are you a plant?
- bayindirh 5y agoYes [0]. I do photosynthesis too. It's great. No need to eat, no need to take a break. The only problem is getting water, but my colleagues and family knows my schedule and pours some water & coffee while passing through. On a serious note, human beings' metabolism is sensitive to light. It's part of how circadian rhythm works [1]. Some people are more sensitive, some people are less. I'm on the more sensitive side. Being forced to wake up before sunrise affects my mood and energy. [0]: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DYRuuP-WkAAJTzs.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DYRuuP-WkAAJTzs.jpg [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian_rhythm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian_rhythm
- betwixthewires 5y agoAt this point your main clocks, your phone and your computer, change themselves for you. Daylight savings time is no big deal really, it's just something to gripe about. That said, I'm heavily in favor of ending it. It's stupid. But I disagree that permanent DST is less stupid than time changes. I think the idea of permanently having the clock say an hour later than it is is just as senseless or more so than the yearly switch. Just end this madness and be done with it.
- Gigachad 5y agoMy watch and bike computer still don't change time automatically which is enough to be annoying.
- kayodelycaon 5y agoAs I posted elsewhere, I'm bipolar and the time changes literally ruin 4 weeks out of the year for me. I wish they had choose EST but fuck it, I'll take EDT. I don't care. I just want this to stop.
- AussieWog93 5y agoSerious question, but how/why is your life ruined, and why so long? I can't imagine a single hour ruining sleep patterns that badly?
- kayodelycaon 5y agoI don't mind the question. :) Discussed that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30692209 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30692209
- AussieWog93 5y agoChrist. That sounds horrible. So glad it'll soon be a thing of the past.
- 5y ago
- edflsafoiewq 5y agoWhat's people's deal with changing clocks? It's never bothered me.
- AYBABTME 5y agoThere's evidence that accident rates and health issues increase by a significant margin right after the clock change that causes a reduction of night sleep by 1h. The book "Why We Sleep" makes a really good argument about it all, and is a generally great book.
- mjbeswick 5y agoAll the comments ignore the fact that until the industrial revolution people didn't sleeps a solid 8 hours a night, as in the past people used to practice polyphasic sleep. People used get up in the middle of night a socialise for a few hours before having their second sleep. Most people have complete control over when they go to bed, as they choose a particular time to go to bed.
- irrational 5y agoEach of our car clocks have to be changed manually. The clocks on the stove and microwave have to be changed manually. We have 7 wall clocks in the house that have to be changed manually. Our kids have alarm clocks that all have to be changed manually. The sprinkler system has a clock that has to be set manually. Even our garage door opener has a clock that has to be set manually. It is a huge pain every six months.
- walnutclosefarm 5y ago> I am in favor of permanent standard time, but failing that, I am super happy with permanent daylight-saving time. Ditto. Switching is the issue for me. And it's not because it's all that disruptive to me personally. But it is highly disruptive, and dangerous to shift workers. The fall change in particularly raised hell in the hospital where I worked, since it literally created an hour that occurred twice. Computers can store time in universal time, but a nurse medicates or does a procedure on a patient by clock time, and that duplicate hour and compressed shift increased risk of patient harm, misrecording of data, and overall stress a lot. And really, it's just dumb.
- giantg2 5y agoAnd in the spring us devs can end up with NonexistentTimeErrors.
- FateOfNations 5y agoThat's a good point... things like "every 4 hours" gets complicated around the time change if you need things to align with a clock
- alophawen 5y agoNot necessarily, just track elapsed time and ignore absolute measures.
- sirmarksalot 5y agoAnd what sort of instrument might you use to track elapsed time?
- gpm 5y agoA computer? Like the stopwatch app on your phone does. (I think I'm missing your point)
- 5y ago
- perfopt 5y agoAir travelers thank and cheer your spirit, pray for your success.
- srj 5y agoNo way. It's brutal getting home and having it already be dark. At least when it's dark in the morning I feel like I'm rising with the day.
- uranusjr 5y agoI read somewhere that one reasoning is with DST, children need to leave for school early, which is relatively unsafe (evening is not a problem because school ends earlier). But I guess the perfect solution is simply shorter work hours across the board :p
- minusSeven 5y agoI don't get it, why does it matter at all? Isn't it just a perception. If you live in Alaska there are days where there is always sunlight and similarly days where there is no light.
- RC_ITR 5y agoDespite being able to survive in nearly any earth climate, much of human biology evolved in a narrow environmental context. Yes, humans survive in Iceland, but since a lot of our evolution occurred under near-equatorial sun, people notice that some of the “nice to have” chemical reactions in our body (e.g. our circadian rhythm) are less common when there. If one’s prefrontal cortex decides to use executive functioning to have the rest of the brain “ignore” that problem, that’s one solution, but many people can’t do that or find it very taxing to do so.
- minusSeven 5y agoEven that can achieved by changing the time you do things. Like schools can be 1 hour early at a particular time of the year instead of changing time for everybody else. Honestly I can't think of a single legitimate reason why you would want to hang onto daylight saving time.
- playa1 5y ago100% this. Permanent DLS seems strange but it is so much better than the insanity of changing the clocks twice a year.
- jjallen 5y agoChanging the time twice a year has never been a big issue for me. Even with a toddler with a sensitive sleeping schedule. It changes on a Saturday night. It's almost not noticeable. One day a year you get one less hour; another day you get one more. I mean if changing the times one hour is so bad, what about flying across 3 or more time zones? While I know that jet lag _does suck_, if changing the time one hour at the least impactful time of week is so insane, it must make traveling very difficult for some people. I'm not even campaigning for stopping or DST or ST (I frankly haven't thought about this problem that much because it just hasn't mattered much to me), I'm just surprised it is considered "insane" or a huge deal to many people.
- RC_ITR 5y agoThe effects of the shift are more pronounced if you are in the western part of your time zone. Detroiters go from 6:40am sunrise to 7:40am sunrise, which tends to get noticed while Bostonians go from 5:55am to 6:55am. Guess where DST was a major political issue in the 20th century (the memory of that and related debates is why the previous generation wanted to ‘let sleeping dogs lie’)
- rocqua 5y agoNote that with UTC in e.g. Australia you either get the date changing at noon, or dates get out of whack. In the US it would be less weird, but still weird.