On Tue, Jan 3, 2017 at 2:18 PM, John Sauter < [email protected]> wrote:
> On Tue, 2017-01-03 at 13:28 -0500, Michael Rothwell wrote: > > > > This was probably covered elsewhere, and I apologize if I missed it, > > but I have a question: > > Why are you in such favor of leap seconds? > > > > -- > > Michael Rothwell > > [email protected] > > (828) 649-ROTH > > I regard leap seconds as a reasonable compromise between the needs of > civil time and of science. Civil time needs a clock that tracks the > days and the seasons. Science requires a clock that measures time in > precise intervals. UTC provides both, using leap seconds to keep > atomic time synchronized with the rotation of the Earth. > > Some people who are inconvenienced by leap seconds are pushing for > their removal. The effect of removing leap seconds will be to burden > future users of civil time, who will see their clock no longer tracking > the rotation of the Earth, and have to do something about it. I feel > it is unethical to burden a future generation for our convenience, > since that future generation has no voice in today's decisions. > > The inconveniences of leap seconds can be overcome by fixing the > software that doesn't handle them correctly. Doing that is a big job, > bigger than fixing the software that didn't handle the year 2000 > correctly. We don't need to fix all the software today, we can chip > away at it, and encourage newly written software to handle time > correctly. > I think you are hopelessly naive. :) How many years (or centuries) would it take for the lack of leap seconds to become a problem? > John Sauter ([email protected]) > > -- > PGP fingerprint E24A D25B E5FE 4914 A603 49EC 7030 3EA1 9A0B 511E > -- Michael Rothwell [email protected] (828) 649-ROTH
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