John Carmichael writes:
>Hey, did anyone see the CNN story last night about the watch company >,"Swatch" that is now selling timepieces which tell "Internet Time"? I >can't remember exactly, but they said one minute of normal time=about 1 1/2 >minutes Internet Time, and that the idea behind it is to facilitate >timekeeping around the world for internet users. Everybody everywhere (even >on Mars?) will be using on the same time! > >Arthur C. Clarke believes that the current timezone system will be abandoned >and everyone will use Universal Time in the future. I agree with Arthur. >Or am I wrong, will we all be using Internet Time instead? You're both wrong. In the future everyone will use local solar time. This is certainly the most natural time for any living thing. The need to physically transport time to find the longitude and the need to provide timekeeping at night and on overcast days led to the rise of mechanical clocks. Unfortunately, these were not sophisticated enough to tell the true time, but had to be satisfied with an unnatural uniform scale. It is, of course, trivial for any microprocessor to convert its clock pulses to solar time and also to convert the time at any other place to the local solar time. If I am in Germany and want to arrange a meeting with someone on Japan, I would say, "After lunch would be good for me, say 2 PM?". My email or voice mail would not only be translated to Japanese, the time would also be translated to the local time of my correspondent, something like 11 PM. The airlines use this principle already, in that the arrival and departure times on the ticket are always the local times. The radio transmitters used now to synchronize clocks will in the near future be ubiquitous and short range, so that you will never have to adjust your watch while traveling. In a similar way, the attempt to change timekeeping to a base ten system is an anachronism. The decimal system is a lifesaver if you have to do complicated (scientific) calculations in your head or on paper. For simple (everyday) calculations, a system based on 12 (or 24 or 60) or possibly 16 is much more convenient. The processors which are taking over all but the simplest calculations for us have no trouble with 12 inches in a foot and 24 hours in a day. The implications this has on the demand generated and respect tendered for the skills preserved in this mailing list are obvious. -- Art Carlson
