[LEAPSECS] WP7A status and Re: clinical evidence about time and sun

[John Cowan]

Rob Seaman scripsit:


> One supposes the lunar synodic period would be divided into 30 parts.


*One* may suppose it, but others have not, such as Manuel Garcia
O'Kelly-Davis, an actual (though fictional) resident of Luna, describing
the timescale discussions of the "Ad-Hoc Congress for Organization of
Free Luna":

	Another time they argued "time."  Sure, Greenwich time
	bears no relation to lunar.  But why should it when we live
	underground?  Show me loonie who can sleep two weeks and
	work two weeks; lunars don't fit our metabolism.  What was
	urged was to make a lunar exactly equal to twenty-eight days
	(instead of 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes, 2.78 seconds)
	and do this by making days longer--and hours, minutes,
	and seconds, thus making each semi-lunar exactly two weeks.

	Sure, lunar is necessary for many purposes.  Controls when
	we go up on surface, why we go, and how long we stay.  But,
	aside from throwing us out of gear with our only neighbor,
	had that wordy vacuum skull thought what this would do
	to every critical figure in science and engineering?  As
	an electronics man I shuddered. Throw away every book,
	table, instrument, and start over?  I know that some of my
	ancestors did that in switching from old English units to
	MKS--but they did it to make things easier.  Fourteen inches
	to a foot and some odd number of feet to a mile.  Ounces
	and pounds.  Oh, Bog!

	Made sense to change that--but why go out of your way to
	create confusion?


> >The World Series does seem an egregiously stupid name, though.

> 

> No - they simply ought to extend it to teams from Japan and the  

> Dominican Republic, etc.


But that wouldn't be the World Series, it would be another thing by
the same name; a thing which arguably should exist, but not meeting
the original issue, which can be met only by rectification of the name.

-- 
John Cowan      cowan at ccil.org         http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
Statistics don't help a great deal in making important decisions.
Most people have more than the average number of feet, but I'm not about
to start a company selling shoes in threes. --Ross Gardler