It's also possible to think of degrees, arcminutes, etc., as a cryptic
notation, given the long history of timekeeping. I have a set of 7-place
trig tables, published in 1958 by H.M. Nautical Almanac Office, with the
argument in time.
For example, this book lists the tangent of 1h 38m 13s as 0.4568685 (because
that amount of time is the same as 24.5541666... degrees).
Roger
-----Original Message-----
From: sundial-boun...@uni-koeln.de [mailto:sundial-boun...@uni-koeln.de] On
Behalf Of Brent
Sent: Tuesday, January 18, 2011 3:03 PM
To: Sundial List
Subject: 360 degree clock
Hello;
If you think about it, hours, minutes and seconds are an awkward system for
using time.
My idea would be to switch to a 360 degree clock.
The earth is round and makes one complete revolution per day, 360 degrees.
So why not measure time based on what angle of degree the earth happens to
be at your location.
Midnight could be 360 degrees
6AM 90 degrees
Noon 180 degrees
6PM 270 degrees
For conversions:
Each hour would equal 15 degrees.
Each degree would equal 4 minutes.
Each degree would equal 240 seconds.
So instead of saying it's 6:34am and 28 seconds it would be:
6x15 = 90
34/4 = 8.5
28/240 =.117
The time would be 98.617 degrees
Of course you wouldn't do conversions, you would just look at your new 360
degree watch.
If I came to work at 98.617 degrees and left at 187.786 degrees I have
worked:
187.786 - 98.617 = 89.169 degrees
Makes more sense to me.
Did anyone ever tell time this way?
It seems like it would work nicely with sundials.
brent
---------------------------------------------------
https://lists.uni-koeln.de/mailman/listinfo/sundial
---------------------------------------------------
https://lists.uni-koeln.de/mailman/listinfo/sundial
