[LEAPSECS] Schedule for success

[Rob Seaman]

So many messages, so little time!

M. Warner Losh wrote:


> In general, all systems need to be synchronized to human time  

> because at some point they have to interact with humans.



	Right.  And human time is synchronized with mean solar time because  
we happen to live on the planet Earth.  What we are debating is how  
this synchronization should happen and on what schedule.


> Sure, it usually doesn't matter much, and you can usually get away  

> with it, but that reason alone is not sufficient to say it is never  

> a problem.



	No, but it is a good argument for following a coherent and  
transparent decision-making process, and for not rushing into a bad  
decision.


> Since we've only been using them for 40 years, there's no real  

> posterity to worry about.



	No.  We have been using mean solar time formally since the 19th  
century, and informally since we woke each morning to light shining  
through the entrance of the cave.  Leap seconds are simply the current  
mechanism for instituting a civil timescale based on mean solar time.


> Since we're going to have to have them with increasing regularity  

> over the next 50 years, to the point where 2 a year are unlikely to  

> be enough, we need to ask ourselves if there's some better way to  

> distribute time than what we're doing.


	The frequency over the next 50 years will be similar to the past 50  
years, and likely for a couple of centuries after that:

	http://six.pairlist.net/pipermail/leapsecs/2008-January/000184.html

It would be delightful to discuss better ways to define and distribute  
civil and professional timescales.  It is hard to find time to do this  
after 9 years of persistent attempts to rush to judgement.

Rob