Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Common Calendrical Fallacies

yourcalendricalfallacyis.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 53 posts

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#31

Post by charcircuit »

cutler wrote: post #30
charcircuit wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought summer started on the summer solstice. I've never heard it called "midsummer's day" Spring: March April May Summer: June July August Fall: September October Novmeber Winter: December January February

That's exactly the fallacy I'm referring to. Mid-Summer's day ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midsummer ) is a calendrical festival observed in many cultures around 24th June close to the summer solstice. How do you define a season? What single factor determines how a season is measured? It's the relative amount of daylight. The summer solstice is the longest day.

>How do you define a season?

I define it as a period of time between a equinox and a solstice.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#32

Post by DylanSp »

noneeeed wrote: post #4

I like this. I've seen a number of "Falshoods programmers believe about X" and they almost never provide examples or explanations, which is rather frustrating for some of the more obscure or weird cases.

Agreed, having examples is a big step up from the usual "Falsehoods" list.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#33

Post by cutler »

charcircuit wrote: post #31
cutler wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly the fallacy I'm referring to. Mid-Summer's day ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midsummer ) is a calendrical festival observed in many cultures around 24th June close to the summer solstice. How do you define a season? What single factor determines how a season is measured? It's the relative amount of daylight. The summer solstice is the longest day.

>How do you define a season? I define it as a period of time between a equinox and a solstice.

But that's just a convention. You're not explaining the phenomenon which gives rise to seasons or even what a season is. If some other culture decided to define equinoxes and solstices as the middle of a season then that would be another valid convention so to get to the root of the matter one has to define what a season is all about. The astronomical essence of seasons is the amount of daylight relative to darkness.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#34

Post by charcircuit »

cutler wrote: post #33
charcircuit wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How do you define a season? I define it as a period of time between a equinox and a solstice.

But that's just a convention. You're not explaining the phenomenon which gives rise to seasons or even what a season is. If some other culture decided to define equinoxes and solstices as the middle of a season then that would be another valid convention so to get to the root of the matter one has to define what a season is all about. The astronomical essence of seasons is the amount of daylight relative to darkness.

I don't really care about what causes it. The exact start and end dates of the seasons don't really matter, nor do they need to be consistent. Each season has things associated with them like fall has leafs turning orange and falling, or snow in winter.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#35

Post by dahfizz »

cutler wrote: post #30
charcircuit wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought summer started on the summer solstice. I've never heard it called "midsummer's day" Spring: March April May Summer: June July August Fall: September October Novmeber Winter: December January February

That's exactly the fallacy I'm referring to. Mid-Summer's day ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midsummer ) is a calendrical festival observed in many cultures around 24th June close to the summer solstice. How do you define a season? What single factor determines how a season is measured? It's the relative amount of daylight. The summer solstice is the longest day.

The entire concept of a "season" is invented. Quantizing a continuous natural phenomena into descreet bits is something humans do with everything, and we nearly never do it rigorously.

When is it "night"? At what exact moment in time does it become "night"? Nobody knows, nobody cares. It's still a useful concept.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#36

Post by cutler »

dahfizz wrote: post #35
cutler wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly the fallacy I'm referring to. Mid-Summer's day ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midsummer ) is a calendrical festival observed in many cultures around 24th June close to the summer solstice. How do you define a season? What single factor determines how a season is measured? It's the relative amount of daylight. The summer solstice is the longest day.

The entire concept of a "season" is invented. Quantizing a continuous natural phenomena into descreet bits is something humans do with everything, and we nearly never do it rigorously. When is it "night"? At what exact moment in time does it become "night"? Nobody knows, nobody cares. It's still a useful concept.

Night is clearly defined by the Sun setting over the horizon and the following rising. The Sun's passage over the meridian is the astronomical midnight.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#37

Post by cutler »

charcircuit wrote: post #34
cutler wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's just a convention. You're not explaining the phenomenon which gives rise to seasons or even what a season is. If some other culture decided to define equinoxes and solstices as the middle of a season then that would be another valid convention so to get to the root of the matter one has to define what a season is all about. The astronomical essence of seasons is the amount of daylight relative to darkness.

I don't really care about what causes it. The exact start and end dates of the seasons don't really matter, nor do they need to be consistent. Each season has things associated with them like fall has leafs turning orange and falling, or snow in winter.

Well now you're defining seasons in terms of weather and we all know how reliable that is. Here in London we've had zero snow this winter so far so does that mean we haven't had a winter? There are plenty of countries, especially the ones close to the equator, who have never experienced snow and whose summers and winters are barely distinguishable in terms of temperature yet they still have a summer and a winter defined by the longest and shortest day of the year.

Re: Common Calendrical Fallacies

#40

Post by 6510 »

clusterfish wrote: post #17
TehShrike wrote: post #10

I wish there was a version of this that only contained examples relevant to e.g. the Gregorian calendar, or even within the subset of the Gregorian calendar specified within POSIX. I get whiplash going back and forth between "relevant thing I need to care about" and "obviously irrelevant" in this list

I'm not sure if this is the original, but here: https://infiniteundo.com/post/25326999628/falsehoods-program...

Ah that one is more useful.

yourcalendricalfallacyis.com should have categories. General > Generic Programming > language specific

Post reply on HN