• Re: xkcd: Time Change

    From Nuno Silva@nunojsilva@invalid.invalid to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 08:12:01 2026
    On 2026-07-18, Scott Lurndal wrote:

    Dimensional Traveler <dtravel@sonic.net> writes:
    On 7/17/2026 11:44 PM, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
    On Fri, 17 Jul 2026 14:43:32 -0500, Lynn McGuire wrote:

    Gonna be dark until 8 am or so in the winter. Still, stopping the
    stupid time changes will be a relief.

    If you’re far enough from the equator for it to matter, then it
    becomes a choice between waking up when it’s still dark, versus
    staying in bed while it gets light. Or alternatively, going to bed
    when it’s still light, versus staying up after it’s already dark.

    Which would you prefer? Because you can’t legislate either the tilt of
    the Earth’s axis, or the way human biological clocks work.

    What I find stupid about the whole thing is the suggestion is to go >>permanent DST. What is wrong with Standard Time?

    At my lat/long, DST simply makes more sense for both winter and
    summer.

    Using ST, the summer solstice dawn would begin before 0400, sunrise at 0600, and set before 2000 - DST shifts both forward an hour.

    Using DST, the winter dawn breaks at 0430 on
    the shortest day, sunrise at 0722 and sunset near 1700 instead of 1600.

    It really depends on how you are positioned in a timezone. Perhaps
    six timezones instead of three would aleviate those difficulties (but
    would likely be a very difficult transition from the current three).

    I can't help but feel that "ST" isn't a good abbreviation to use here,
    because if one looks at some timezones, ST surely means "Summer Time"
    (cf. EET-EEST, CET-CEST, WET-WEST), yet given the "DST" I suppose this
    is about the wording used in e.g. US timezone names, "Standard Time"
    (even though there you'd probably call summer time "DT", not "DST")...

    Is there any established way to refer to these that's better?
    --
    Nuno Silva
  • From Gary R. Schmidt@grschmidt@acm.org to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 18:38:33 2026
    On 20/07/2026 15:36, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
    On Mon, 20 Jul 2026 04:53:49 GMT, Crryptoengineer wrote:

    Agreed, being at the eastern or western edge of a timezone makes an
    hours difference in daylight.

    Timezones aren’t necessarily 15° wide, or even centred around the corresponding mean solar time, or anywhere near it. Quite often their demarcations are determined by political issues.

    For example, when flying from Kuala Lumpur to Jakarta, there is a net eastward change in longitude, yet you set your clock back by an hour
    when you get there.

    And the Chinese Empire uses one time zone across the entire country.

    Makes the lusers who bitch about an hour's darkness/lightness appear
    even more sad and pathetic.

    We still suffer from knuckle-draggers who scream that, "It will fade the curtains," particularly in FNQ, but even in the civilised portions of
    godzone they appear from time to time.

    "Clock Time," in any locale, is a human invention, get over it, FFS.

    Cheers,
    Gary B-)
  • From scott@scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 14:17:03 2026
    Crryptoengineer <user3070@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

    scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) posted:

    ERROR "unexpected byte sequence starting at index 83: '\xE2'" while decoding:

    Dimensional Traveler <dtravel@sonic.net> writes:
    On 7/17/2026 11:44 PM, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
    On Fri, 17 Jul 2026 14:43:32 -0500, Lynn McGuire wrote:

    Gonna be dark until 8 am or so in the winter. Still, stopping the
    stupid time changes will be a relief.

    If you’re far enough from the equator for it to matter, then it
    becomes a choice between waking up when it’s still dark, versus
    staying in bed while it gets light. Or alternatively, going to bed
    when it’s still light, versus staying up after it’s already dark.

    Which would you prefer? Because you can’t legislate either the tilt of
    the Earth’s axis, or the way human biological clocks work.

    What I find stupid about the whole thing is the suggestion is to go
    permanent DST. What is wrong with Standard Time?

    At my lat/long, DST simply makes more sense for both winter and
    summer.

    Using ST, the summer solstice dawn would begin before 0400, sunrise at 0600, >> and set before 2000 - DST shifts both forward an hour.

    Using DST, the winter dawn breaks at 0430 on
    the shortest day, sunrise at 0722 and sunset near 1700 instead of 1600.

    It really depends on how you are positioned in a timezone. Perhaps
    six timezones instead of three would aleviate those difficulties (but
    would likely be a very difficult transition from the current three).

    The continental US has 4 timezones.

    Brainfart. I don't know anyone in mountain time...


    Agreed, being at the eastern or western edge of a timezone makes an hours >difference in daylight. There really isn't an elegant solution. I'd prefer whatever
    setting puts solar noon closest to clock noon.

    Why?
  • From Dimensional Traveler@dtravel@sonic.net to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 07:18:51 2026
    On 7/19/2026 10:55 AM, The True Melissa wrote:
    Verily, in article <ge0q5lpp3j982qs00c7ej5qgho89n5a7cq@4ax.com>, did psperson@old.netcom.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Sat, 18 Jul 2026 22:09:59 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D?Oliveiro
    <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

    The whole point with the clock changeovers is precisely to try to
    maintain some rough synchronization with that sunrise time, I would
    think.

    The original point was to keep Defence Plants working longer hours
    because the light lasted longer. There was, after all, a war on.

    The version I've heard is that it was for farmers, so they would have
    more daylight in the winter.

    With either version or any other, there are still exactly the same
    number of minutes of daylight in any given day. Renumbering them doesn't
    save or lose anything. If some enterprises want to adjust their hours of operation with the calendar, they should adjust their own schedules
    instead of altering the clock.

    Agreed.
    --
    I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
    dirty old man.
  • From Paul S Person@psperson@old.netcom.invalid to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 09:20:31 2026
    On Mon, 20 Jul 2026 04:53:49 GMT, Crryptoengineer <user3070@newsgrouper.org.invalid> wrote:
    <snppo>
    The continental US has 4 timezones.

    Agreed, being at the eastern or western edge of a timezone makes an hours >difference in daylight. There really isn't an elegant solution. I'd prefer whatever
    setting puts solar noon closest to clock noon.
    That would be Standard Time.
    DST, by definition, puts clock noon closest to solar 1PM.
    The system (if that's the word) this replaced was for each town to use
    the correct solar time. The train schedules were ... interesting. The
    four time zones were used to simplify this.
    Ptolemy, IIRC, has an entire table giving sunrise/sunset times at
    various latitudes. Also how long the hours were: an hour (in the
    daytime[1]) back then was a fraction (1/12, IIRC, or maybe 1/10 IIDRC)
    the time between sunrise and sunset. Mechanical clocks helped
    standardize the length of the hour.
    [1] The night was divided into "watches", at least in some places.
    --
    "Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
    Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
    Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"
  • From Paul S Person@psperson@old.netcom.invalid to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 09:27:52 2026
    On Mon, 20 Jul 2026 08:12:01 +0100, Nuno Silva
    <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> wrote:
    On 2026-07-18, Scott Lurndal wrote:

    Dimensional Traveler <dtravel@sonic.net> writes:
    On 7/17/2026 11:44 PM, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
    On Fri, 17 Jul 2026 14:43:32 -0500, Lynn McGuire wrote:

    Gonna be dark until 8 am or so in the winter. Still, stopping the
    stupid time changes will be a relief.

    If you’re far enough from the equator for it to matter, then it
    becomes a choice between waking up when it’s still dark, versus
    staying in bed while it gets light. Or alternatively, going to bed
    when it’s still light, versus staying up after it’s already dark.

    Which would you prefer? Because you can’t legislate either the tilt of >>>> the Earth’s axis, or the way human biological clocks work.

    What I find stupid about the whole thing is the suggestion is to go >>>permanent DST. What is wrong with Standard Time?

    At my lat/long, DST simply makes more sense for both winter and
    summer.

    Using ST, the summer solstice dawn would begin before 0400, sunrise at 0600, >> and set before 2000 - DST shifts both forward an hour.

    Using DST, the winter dawn breaks at 0430 on
    the shortest day, sunrise at 0722 and sunset near 1700 instead of 1600.

    It really depends on how you are positioned in a timezone. Perhaps
    six timezones instead of three would aleviate those difficulties (but
    would likely be a very difficult transition from the current three).

    I can't help but feel that "ST" isn't a good abbreviation to use here, >because if one looks at some timezones, ST surely means "Summer Time"
    (cf. EET-EEST, CET-CEST, WET-WEST), yet given the "DST" I suppose this
    is about the wording used in e.g. US timezone names, "Standard Time"
    (even though there you'd probably call summer time "DT", not "DST")...

    Is there any established way to refer to these that's better?
    This may help: <https://www.timeanddate.com/time/standard-time.html>
    Note that it equates "Standard Time" with "winter time" and DST with
    "summer time", "especially in the UK".
    So feel free to regard using as ST as yet another USA-ism, from the
    perspective of the UK.
    It also this interesting factoid:
    "More than 60% of the countries in the world use standard time all
    year."
    --
    "Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
    Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
    Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"
  • From Paul S Person@psperson@old.netcom.invalid to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 09:30:19 2026
    On Mon, 20 Jul 2026 07:18:51 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
    <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
    On 7/19/2026 10:55 AM, The True Melissa wrote:
    Verily, in article <ge0q5lpp3j982qs00c7ej5qgho89n5a7cq@4ax.com>, did
    psperson@old.netcom.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Sat, 18 Jul 2026 22:09:59 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D?Oliveiro
    <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

    The whole point with the clock changeovers is precisely to try to
    maintain some rough synchronization with that sunrise time, I would
    think.

    The original point was to keep Defence Plants working longer hours
    because the light lasted longer. There was, after all, a war on.

    The version I've heard is that it was for farmers, so they would have
    more daylight in the winter.

    With either version or any other, there are still exactly the same
    number of minutes of daylight in any given day. Renumbering them doesn't
    save or lose anything. If some enterprises want to adjust their hours of
    operation with the calendar, they should adjust their own schedules
    instead of altering the clock.

    Agreed.
    Remember the trouble businesses had getting workers to come back to
    the office after the pandemic ended?
    And you want them to do this twice every year?
    --
    "Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
    Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
    Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"
  • From Dimensional Traveler@dtravel@sonic.net to rec.arts.sf.written on Mon Jul 20 17:37:53 2026
    On 7/20/2026 9:30 AM, Paul S Person wrote:
    On Mon, 20 Jul 2026 07:18:51 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
    <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:

    On 7/19/2026 10:55 AM, The True Melissa wrote:
    Verily, in article <ge0q5lpp3j982qs00c7ej5qgho89n5a7cq@4ax.com>, did
    psperson@old.netcom.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Sat, 18 Jul 2026 22:09:59 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D?Oliveiro
    <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

    The whole point with the clock changeovers is precisely to try to
    maintain some rough synchronization with that sunrise time, I would
    think.

    The original point was to keep Defence Plants working longer hours
    because the light lasted longer. There was, after all, a war on.

    The version I've heard is that it was for farmers, so they would have
    more daylight in the winter.

    With either version or any other, there are still exactly the same
    number of minutes of daylight in any given day. Renumbering them doesn't >>> save or lose anything. If some enterprises want to adjust their hours of >>> operation with the calendar, they should adjust their own schedules
    instead of altering the clock.

    Agreed.

    Remember the trouble businesses had getting workers to come back to
    the office after the pandemic ended?

    And you want them to do this twice every year?

    I'm not. I think that businesses should simply set their hours however
    they want _without_ changing them twice a year.
    --
    I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
    dirty old man.
  • From wollman@wollman@hergotha.csail.mit.edu (Garrett Wollman) to rec.arts.sf.written on Tue Jul 21 01:32:54 2026
    In article <113mf0v$1jpv7$1@dont-email.me>,
    Dimensional Traveler <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:

    I'm not. I think that businesses should simply set their hours however
    they want _without_ changing them twice a year.

    That *doesn't help*.

    Retail businesses want their customers (nb: not their employees) to
    get out of work while there is still daylight, because they spend
    more when the sun is out after 6 p.m.

    Electric utilities want peak electric consumption to take place when
    there is a surplus of low-cost solar energy, not an hour after sunset.

    -GAWollman
    --
    Garrett A. Wollman | "Act to avoid constraining the future; if you can, wollman@bimajority.org| act to remove constraint from the future. This is Opinions not shared by| a thing you can do, are able to do, to do together."
    my employers. | - Graydon Saunders, _A Succession of Bad Days_ (2015)