Rob Seaman scripsit:
> The point is, however, that nothing - absolutely nothing -
> would then protect legal timekeeping in the U.S. or elsewhere from
> the whims of future timekeepers at the ITU.
I regret to state that this remark appears to me no more than
scaremongering. The laws of the United States are not the
laws of the Medes and the Persians[*], subject to no repeal.
If the U.S. tied its legal time to the ITU, it could untie
it in future if that seems like a good idea.
In any case, changing the legal definition of U.S. time from GMT
to UTC merely regularizes the de facto position, since GMT no
longer has a specific international definition.
> What in practice would stop these individuals
> from leaping the clock forward or backward at will, or from changing
> the rate of UTC, or for that matter from making the clocks run
> backwards?
The fact of being rendered irrelevant, not to say a laughingstock.
What is to prevent the IERS from issuing bogus leap second announcements?
[*] I am not referring here to the Islamic Republic of Iran.
--
LEAR: Dost thou call me fool, boy? John Cowan
FOOL: All thy other titles http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
thou hast given away: cowan_at_ccil.org
That thou wast born with.
Received on Wed Jul 05 2006 - 01:22:21 PDT