3 ms·
> Why should the only visible marker of the day---noon---not be approximately noon on the clock? Conversely, why should it? Clocks are artificial devices that
by adhesive_wombat 4y ago
> Why should the only visible marker of the day---noon---not be approximately noon on the clock?
Conversely, why should it? Clocks are artificial devices that serve human needs, there's no physical law that says you can't have the top of the clock be sunrise every day, or any other system you could imagine.
- inciampati 4y agoYeah there is no physical law that prevents that. Except that sunrise is not stable, so now your whole time system needs to slew and skew around to match the changes, and the meaning of day divisions changes seasonally and even daily. Considering all that there might actually be some physical limits to what my infinite life Casio watch is going to handle. Maybe when it gets GPS it could work.
- tzs 4y ago> Except that sunrise is not stable, so now your whole time system needs to slew and skew around to match the changes, and the meaning of day divisions changes seasonally and even daily Wait a second...that's only because you are using noon as a reference. The intervals from noons to consecutive noons decrease for half the year and increase for half the year, averaging 24 hours, with the swing being about a minute. Similar for the intervals from sunrises to consecutive sunrises, except the swing can reach around 4 or 5 minutes. Either of those is stable enough to use its average as a reference.