Re: [LEAPSECS] Wall Street Journal Article

From: Poul-Henning Kamp <phk_at_haven.FREEBSD.DK>
Date: Mon, 01 Aug 2005 21:51:00 +0200

In message <20050801194057.GP6204_at_NYCMJCOWA2>, "John.Cowan" writes:

>Eventually that will become impossible. When solar days are 48 (current)
>hours long, we will just have to get used to the idea that every other
>waking period is in darkness.

I think you overlook the biological adaptability here.

Our circadian rythm is not close to 24 hours by accident.

>> As I said more than four years ago (http://iraf.noao.edu/
>> ~seaman/leap), in the far future there are few options other than
>> readjusting the length of the civil second to recalibrate to match
>> the slowing Earth.
>
>What, and recalculate every single measurement ever made involving
>length or duration? A complete nightmare.

I think we should give Rob the benefit of the doubt and let him
elaborate on this, I don't think anybody who argues for the
leapsecond quirks of UTC to be retained would advocate changing
the SI second, so he must mean something else...

--
Poul-Henning Kamp       | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20
phk_at_FreeBSD.ORG         | TCP/IP since RFC 956
FreeBSD committer       | BSD since 4.3-tahoe
Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence.
Received on Mon Aug 01 2005 - 12:51:19 PDT

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