4 ms·
Conversely, why should the "middle" of our daily schedule, when lunch breaks etc. are scheduled, have to coincide with the solar maximum? Modern society compre
by ajross 4y ago
Conversely, why should the "middle" of our daily schedule, when lunch breaks etc. are scheduled, have to coincide with the solar maximum? Modern society compresses "boring stuff" into the first half of the day and puts the fun stuff at the end. Why not give it more light?
Meh. Just pick something, I guess. But this isn't an engineering problem and there's no correct solution.
- _ph_ 4y agoOur breaks don't have to coincide with the solar maximum. We can set them at any time we want. Which is why "permanent dst" makes no sense. However, calibrating our wall time so that noon marks the high point of the sun is the obviously correct thing from setting up the system. This is why this has been done historically. What we decide as the right time to get up, have lunch, is derived from the calibration. People who live at the extreme ends of a time zone tend to adjust their day schedule accordingly.
- jameshart 4y agoTook me years after moving to the US to get used to the idea that 12-1 is lunch hour, rather than 1-2.
- inciampati 4y agoAnd also not 2:30-4...
- sandworm101 4y ago>> this isn't an engineering problem and there's no correct solution. It was an engineering problem, very literally an engineer problem. Standardized time zones were needed to keep trains, the big heavy things driven by engineers, from smacking into each other at speed. Coordinating all the train station clocks wasn't done for social reasons but for safety and efficiency. Imagine trying to run a modern air transport network if every airport changed its clock a few minutes every day. Total chaos.
- ajross 4y agoI don't know about trains specifically, but air transport planning happens in UTC for exactly that reason. If "time zones" were indeed an engineering solution, they were the wrong solution.
- sandworm101 4y agoTime zones are part of standard time, but the core concept is that everyone agrees to synchronize their clocks. Time zones are an abstraction layer above.