> -----Original Message-----
> From: Karen Etheridge [mailto:p...@froods.org]
> Sent: Monday, August 23, 2010 1:42 PM
>
> Totally off-topic, but this reminded me of a book I recently completed,
> "Martian Rainbow" by Robert L. Forward, which spelled out the details of
> a functional Martian calendar that both worked for laypeople and didn't
> upset the scientists too much:
Continuing off-topic...
Karen,
That's quite a headache inducing solution by Forward. For another Mars
time solution, there's a simper one in John Varley's book Red Lighting. I
didn't like the book that much, but he attempts to use Earth hours & minutes to
"make the tourists happy" and after reading Forward's solution, I'm guessing
his reader's too. His "solution" is to program all the clocks to pause for
39.5 minutes at midnight to keep in sync with Earth. The locals call it "the
Pause".
http://books.google.com/books?id=-JU8DLAnTiQC&pg=PA16&lpg=PA16&dq=john+varley+red+lightning+mars+time&source=bl&ots=Aeqpb2Q5g1&sig=hcx6DfJlQKzgkUInRfqWFjbYqa8&hl=en&ei=xuNyTPjwBYKClAeu4pDHDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CDwQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=martian%20hours&f=false
That said, I don't think he really thought it through very well. If martian
days are longer, no amount of pausing or jumping ahead is going to make your
planet rotate any faster, which, funny enough, is one of the jokes he makes
about the expectations of tourists.
Anyone know if Edgar Rice Burroughs solved the Mars/Earth time issue in his
books?
Bobby
