People who work in an office don't plan their lives around the sun, but farmers still do. Proposed is a secondary time system to be used alongside our primary system. Unqualified references to time would still refer to the local timezone (like for television listings), but small local events would be suffixed with a "solar time" qualifier (like "08:00 sol." for a rural community's church service or store opening"). Two methods of conversion are proposed, but only one should be used to avoid confusion. In the simpler case, the sunrise and sunset times would be fixed at 06:00 and 18:00, and the day would run at two constant speeds (as the cesium decays) with a sudden acceleration and deceleration between them. In the smoother case--feasible because few people would be doing this calculation by hand--the speed of the day would run sinusoidally to avoid the sudden jerk at sun-up and sun-down.
-- kevinthenerd, Oct 18 2012

Scale for calculating unequal hours http://www.mhs.ox.a...7.tinyCALENDAR.html
16th century European [pocmloc, Oct 18 2012]

Different types of hours http://www.sundials.co.uk/tbhou.htm
How many do you want? [pocmloc, Oct 18 2012]

telling time without a clock http://hea-www.harvard.edu/ECT/Daymarks/
[xandram, Oct 18 2012]

I almost forgot to mention: The biggest motivation for this idea is to provide the benefits of Daylight Saving Time to people who need it while eliminating it for people like me who live by artificial lighting.
-- kevinthenerd, Oct 18 2012


So, instead of re-setting our clocks twice a year, you're proposing that we re-set them twice a week. All individually scheduled events, such as medical appointments and birthday parties, will go by the new system, causing confusion for farmers and lumberjacks but (supposedly) making it easier for everyone else. Meanwhile all major events (television programs, concerts, executions) will be scheduled using the old system, requiring everyone who uses the new system (read: everyone who works indoors) to perform algorithmic calculations just to figure out what time 'The Big Bang Theory' is coming on.

Sounds simple enough to me.
-- Alterother, Oct 18 2012


//sunrise and sunset times would be fixed at 06:00 and 18:00, and the day would run at two constant speeds// This is totally baked in medieval times and before, it is known as "unequal hours". Many medieval astrolabes had lines on them for quick and easy conversion between the "unequal hours" system and the "equal hours" system that we use nowadays.

Once I saw a 19th century Japanese clock that had a western clockwork mechanism so the hour hand revolved at a constant speed, once every 24 hours. The hour markers were attached to a sliding track. The clockmaker would visit each week to adjust the positions of the markers.
-- pocmloc, Oct 18 2012


While we're at it, can I get a personally tracking orbital mirror so it doesn't have to get dark so early? (+)
-- normzone, Oct 18 2012


//you're proposing that we re-set them twice a week//

No, he's proposing new clocks that speed up in the winter and slow down in the summer.
-- Voice, Oct 18 2012


I don't entirely see why the world can't just be sensible and adopt GMT universally. So, in some countries you'd start work at 3am just after the sun came up. In others, you'd go to bed at 9am, long after the sun had set. What of it?

To insist that every country be given its own time zone is a bit like arguing that every country have its own meridian.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 18 2012


You're just jealous that the US gets seven hours for every one of yours.
-- Alterother, Oct 18 2012


// avoid the sudden jerk at sun-up and sun-down.//

There are at least two possible comments here, neither of which I will make.

//the US gets seven hours for every one of yours//

Ah, but theirs are in Fahrenheit whereas ours are in Celsius, and therefore bigger and more solidly constructed.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 18 2012


// There are at least two possible comments here, neither of which I will make //

Actually, there are five, but two of them are only because this is a U.S. election year, and the one about Richard Branson can be taken as read.
-- 8th of 7, Oct 18 2012


I'm rather partial to the one about Guam.
-- Alterother, Oct 18 2012


[+] but solar time should be the standard and the timezone average the subnoted.
-- FlyingToaster, Oct 19 2012



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