xkcd #3272: Time Change
Title text:
All discussions of daylight saving time policy are doomed by a mix of contradictory, inconsistent, and impossible preferences, which is why I think the only thing we can really hope to do is to make it worse.
Transcript:
Transcript will show once it’s been added to explainxkcd.com
Source: https://xkcd.com/3272/
40 replies
maybe we could restructure our society so everyone gets enough sleep according to their own circadian rhythm. that would be cool.
I don't know... that sort of thing might not make billionaires even wealthier.
crazy fact, well rested people are more productive than tired people, and more productive people make more money. but we all know it isnt really about the money for them dont we?
Honestly, the wealthy just want us to be miserable.
Do you think they are so smart?
Dumb. Much better idea is to split the daylight into 12 equal chunks and the night into 12 equal chunks so we have 24 hours a day 12 of which are light and 12 of which are dark.
It's so simple. We just got to change the definition of an hour everyday.
An 8 h work day during the winter flies by, but the lunch hour is only long enough for one bite sandwich. On the other hand, 12 h of night is plenty enough for all my hobbies.
In the summer, work devours your entire life and there’s hardly any time to sleep.
Just normalize 4h work days :D
Sounds good to me. In this case, 4 flexible hours of work in the summer means about 6 fixed length hours. In the winter those 4 flexible hours translate to about 2 fixed length hours, so I think I'll have plenty of time for my hobbies.
One can dream of such a beautiful future
This is exactly what I was thinking. Smaller working hours. Or at least smaller around the peak of summer and winter.
They used to do this. Hours were divisions of the day, like slices of a pie, rather than a specific length of time.
Using equal hours, and dividing them into minutes, was something only astronomers did to help with their calculations.
It kind of makes sense in a way. It feels more natural
*twice every day
Twice a day or once a day for the day hours length vs night length hours. Also for every latitude as well. What a simple system
We can make up for it by skipping a leap year every 24 years
I hate to complicate things but we already skip leap years…
That's leap days. We also skip leap minutes occasionally. I think we've only removed whole years in retrospect.
Leap year is the term for the year a leap day occurs in. I also don't believe there have ever been full leap minutes, just leap seconds.
I love it when the occasional person comes through arguing that we should just get rid of time zones so it’s the same time everywhere. Always a fun discussion.
What about splitting each time zone into 60 parts, so they are in increments on 1 minute instead of one hour?
Fantastic idea!
Personalized timezones based on solar noon for wherever you will be that day. We'll need an army of precogs to chart every one's future noon whereabouts. But I think it will be well worth it.
it exists already. but besides that. what numbers are assigned to what sun location is completely arbitrary and a man made convention.
if my 7:00 turns into 14:00 my job will expect me at the new 14:00
So You Want To Abolish Time Zones
Half of that looks like an American defending imperial measurement system.
We already tried that!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swatch_Internet_Time
Notable context for the rest of the world: the US Congress is currently debating ending the changing of the clocks every spring and fall.
That can be read both as intended, and as if congress has the debate every spring and fall. Both of which are true.
Better idea: hack the Earth’s code and do away with this annoying axial tilt thing. It’s super inconvenient.
#disable_the_wobble
#hack_the_planet
#tilt_it_back
If you modify the hypnogogic prompt you might get away with it..... Or enable a nuclear war.
How about using same time for entire globe?
Sure as long as the globe adopts the one I live in.
I just want the sun to go down by 7 every day
By 8*
You do realize changing the idea of changing the clocks to be either one hour forward or one hour backwards doesn't change the fact that the sun changes position throughout the year.
The summer will feel long and the winter will feel short no matter what. At least in the US.
You can hate it all you want but it's to account for the fact the days do actually get shorter and longer.
Take it from someone who doesn't have to change their clocks, it's way easier to deal with that way. The whole process is so gradual you barely even notice it.
Well I guess in New England it works out better cause it does get dark out earlier in the winter. It's like some Baltic regions being am/pm vs 24hr.