Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time • Hacker News Board

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#81

Post by dahart » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:39 PM UTC

reidacdc wrote: post #15

The article is mostly suitably modest about mechanisms, focusing on the epidemiology of the observed effects, and it's more or less obvious to me that the transitions are disruptive to everyone, and especially so to sensitive individuals. But there's also a bit in the answer to the fourth question (about long-term vs short-term impacts) that mentions effects of "chronic circadian misalignment". I've seen this a few t…

> Surely one or the other of these groups always has at least half an hour of circadian misalignment?

What is circadian misalignment? Nothing I see on Wikipedia backs up the idea that circadian rhythms are aligned to solar noon (which is what the interviewee in the article claimed). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian_rhythm

The very idea of chronic circadian misalignment due to DST seems a bit suspect since we know circadian rhythms are driven in part by changes in light, and they adapt reasonably quickly over time to changes in environment (“entrainment”). Sunrise and sunset are the main changes in light, while solar noon is one of the moments when light is changing the least. We also know computer screens and indoor lighting are affecting circadian rhythms, so isn’t it likely that games, Netflix and internet use are orders of magnitude more concerning than a one hour shift twice a year. DST is a smaller change in my sleep habits than my weekly swing!

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#82

Post by ChrisLomont » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:39 PM UTC

user5994461 wrote: post #11

varispeed wrote: post #5

I don't know how someone ever could think this is a good idea and also got so many governments to implement this. Whoever is behind it, he or she is a genius of evil. Let's ditch this nonsense now.

This was done to save electricity. More direct sun, less light and heating. Historically in France the saving was equivalent to the whole consumption of the city of Paris over the day (maybe 10-20% of the whole country). It seems people don't care about energy anymore ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

“ Our main finding is that -- contrary to the policy's intent -- DST increases residential electricity demand.” [1]

When you trade lighting costs for heating costs DST may well be more expensive.

[1] https://www.nber.org/papers/w14429

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#83

Post by loloquwowndueo » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:41 PM UTC

user5994461 wrote: post #11

varispeed wrote: post #5

I don't know how someone ever could think this is a good idea and also got so many governments to implement this. Whoever is behind it, he or she is a genius of evil. Let's ditch this nonsense now.

This was done to save electricity. More direct sun, less light and heating. Historically in France the saving was equivalent to the whole consumption of the city of Paris over the day (maybe 10-20% of the whole country). It seems people don't care about energy anymore ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

This argument never held, particularly because the brunt of the social cost is borne by regular people but we never see a decrease in our energy bills compared to prior to DST.

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#84

Post by throw0101a » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:42 PM UTC

It should be noted that the folks who study this:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronobiology

Seem to have come to a consensus that if we're going to get rid of DST, then health-wise it is best to have Standard Time year-round:

> As an international organization of scientists dedicated to studying circadian and other biological rhythms, the Society for Research on Biological Rhythms (SRBR) engaged experts in the field to write a Position Paper on the consequences of choosing to live on DST or Standard Time (ST). The authors take the position that, based on comparisons of large populations living in DST or ST or on western versus eastern edges of time zones, the advantages of permanent ST outweigh switching to DST annually or permanently.

* https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/07487304198541...

For a longer-read, referencing quite a bit of academic literature, but a conclusionary snippet:

> In summary, the scientific literature strongly argues against the switching between DST and Standard Time and even more so against adopting DST permanently. The latter would exaggerate all the effects described above /beyond/ the simple extension of DST from approximately 8 months/year to 12 months/year (depending on country) since /body clocks/ are generally even later during winter than during the long photoperiods of summer (with DST) (Kantermann et al., 2007; Hadlow et al., 2014, 2018; Hashizaki et al., 2018). Perennial DST increases SJL prevalence even more, as described above.

* https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphys.2019.0094...

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#85

Post by macg333 » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:42 PM UTC

I moved to Arizona a few year ago. DST is not practiced here and it is so nice. Even if you can bounce back from the physical toll of DST relatively quickly there is still a substantial amount of psychological anticipation regarding DST thay I, n=1, really enjoy no longer thinking about...

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#86

Post by jcranmer » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:42 PM UTC

ChrisLomont wrote: post #82

user5994461 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was done to save electricity. More direct sun, less light and heating. Historically in France the saving was equivalent to the whole consumption of the city of Paris over the day (maybe 10-20% of the whole country). It seems people don't care about energy anymore ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

“ Our main finding is that -- contrary to the policy's intent -- DST increases residential electricity demand.” [1] When you trade lighting costs for heating costs DST may well be more expensive. [1] https://www.nber.org/papers/w14429

Don't forget about extra A/C costs as well!

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#87

Post by rasengan » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:44 PM UTC

Cows will be upset.

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#88

Post by Jasper_ » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:45 PM UTC

app4soft wrote: post #26

imglorp wrote: post #12

Social issues aside, the software perspective of keeping up with DST is very costly. Every time any government entity anywhere on Earth changes its mind about what zone they're in and when, the IANA needs to reissue the TZDB. Then every OS and platform vendor needs to patch up to a new TZDB. Just for laughs, Java seems to have its own TZDB so in general your OS and application layer might disagree about zones. This i…

> the software perspective of keeping up with DST is very costly. To be clear, the software perspective is to use Unix time instead.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_time

Unix time says nothing about which timezone you're in.

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#89

Post by throw0101a » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:45 PM UTC

reidacdc wrote: post #15

The article is mostly suitably modest about mechanisms, focusing on the epidemiology of the observed effects, and it's more or less obvious to me that the transitions are disruptive to everyone, and especially so to sensitive individuals. But there's also a bit in the answer to the fourth question (about long-term vs short-term impacts) that mentions effects of "chronic circadian misalignment". I've seen this a few t…

Two papers on why Standard Time should be used everywhere:

* https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/07487304198541...

* https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphys.2019.0094...

Re: Governments Worldwide Consider Ditching Daylight Saving Time

#90

Post by hunter2_ » Sat, Oct 31, 2020, 2:45 PM UTC

imglorp wrote: post #61

app4soft wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the software perspective of keeping up with DST is very costly. To be clear, the software perspective is to use Unix time instead.[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_time

Not really. Most machines use UTC internally (with varying epoch dates to represent it). And this is absolutely great until you need to interface with meatbags, ie local time. It's not just display of time either: think about anything Cron does in localtime, eg backups or open building door locks, or send an ACH payment file; then ponder all the corner cases of DST switches. Eg do you do something twice, or never? Wh…

I doubt anyone wants something to occur twice, but they might have an opinion on whether a 1:30am job should occur on the first 1:30am or the second 1:30am in the fall change. For the spring change, I think all jobs scheduled between 2am and 3am (a period that collapses into a moment) should ideally occur at said moment, but I can see how a smear might be more practical in many cases.

I don't recall how `cron` and other schedulers handle it, though.