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Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

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Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#321

Post by cercatrova »

pantojax45 wrote: post #299
School-Cotton wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I say holdouts, because it helps to understand that this isn’t agreed on even within the US. I disagree. I can’t remember having ever seen calendars display any day other than Sunday as the first of the week, except in the case of computer software made by non-Americans who didn’t think to localize it.

There’s still ambiguity in verbal language. On Sunday, if someone messages you “let’s do this next week” - do they mean “in the next 6 days” or “after 7 days from now”?

Almost universally meant to mean in the next 6 days. Next week implies after 7 days.

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#323

Post by int_19h »

bluecalm wrote: post #180
function_seven wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve always loved that idea. So did Kodak https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Fixed_Calendar

It's a bit different though. I think the are reasons for 12 months, 7 days per week, 3 months quarters etc. My version keeps it all and avoids points in "disadvantages" section of the Wikipedia article.

There's no strong reason for 12 months.

7 days per week seems to be so ubiquitous now because religions that depended on that particular cycle (Judaism originally, and from thence Christianity and Islam) are so popular. But, historically, societies have successfully existed with weeks ranging anywhere from 5 to 10 days. Romans, in particular, had an 8-day week for most of their history.

(7 days per week has a more natural meaning if your calendar is lunar overall, so that weeks can be aligned with months. But lunar calendars are overall very messy due to disagreements with the solar cycle, so it's best to not go there in the first place.)

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#324

Post by Fatnino »

octobus2021 wrote: post #63

This is absolutely hilarious, and despite being long form, fits Twitter format very well, with each chunk funnier than the last :) A few notes: - Per my knowledge US is the only country which stubbornly (and illogically) considers Sunday to be the first day of the week; - US (and maybe one or two English-speaking countries) are the only ones using 12h time, the rest of the world uses 24hrs, however 12h _sometimes_ is…

In Hebrew the days of the week don't really have names. They are simply called (direct translation here) "first day" "second day" etc. Except for Saturday which is called "Shabbat" instead of "seventh day".

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#325

Post by Judgmentality »

_k9eq wrote: post #154

I find the implication that aliens are rational and have no subrational concepts due to tradition and habit interesting, as it sort of implies that these kinds of outgrowths are not necessary and can just be done away with. The narrator starts from a position of not wanting to legitimize or historicize beyond reductive statements like "some ancient civilization did XYZ". I'll admit that I skimmed through the last par…

[flagged]

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#326

Post by foone »

camdenlock wrote: post #74

Sounds like a person who thinks they know better than everyone else, that the tradeoffs accumulated in a system are just arbitrary and worthless. “Tear it all down, I can build something MUCH better!” I look forward to the day when this person’s wishes to not be shared on HN are granted in full.

yeah, same. they really need to be blocked from HN, permanently.

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#327

Post by paines »

skipants wrote: post #227
gorbypark wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a English Canadian who works for a company that was bought by an American company and was force switched to Sunday as the first day of the week….what? Maybe we “officially” or legally have Sundays as the first day but my entire life has been Mondays first. Every calendar I’ve had has been that way as well. It still messes with my mind, even four years later, that at work Sunday is the first day of the week.

I'm from Winnipeg originally and considered Sunday the first day of the week. Maybe it's regional or cultural?

It doesn't truly matter or? It's not like you are going to work on sundays. You only realize it with calenders in e.g. Outlook, and long gone TV guides....

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#328

Post by glandium »

narag wrote: post #133
octobus2021 wrote: post #63

This is absolutely hilarious, and despite being long form, fits Twitter format very well, with each chunk funnier than the last :) A few notes: - Per my knowledge US is the only country which stubbornly (and illogically) considers Sunday to be the first day of the week; - US (and maybe one or two English-speaking countries) are the only ones using 12h time, the rest of the world uses 24hrs, however 12h _sometimes_ is…

Honestly I didn't find it funny, maybe because it ignores the reasons of the inconsistencies, that by the way are perfectly understandable looking at space. Months are related to Moon's orbit, weeks to its phases. Months have other gods's names: Janus, Phoebe, Mars, Aphrodite, Maya, Juno... Julius and Augustus were emperors and from that point are just numerals, starting at March. It was associated with Mars because…

Also, if you start in March, it suddenly makes sense that leap year adjustments are done in February (and also that it's the shortest month to begin with).

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#329

Post by forinti »

fimdomeio wrote: post #232
retrac wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Per my knowledge US is the only country which stubbornly (and illogically) considers Sunday to be the first day of the week /Officially/ almost everyone has standardized on ISO 8601 where Monday = 1 and Sunday = 7. But unofficially, not really. The week is still popularly understood to start on Sunday in English Canada, and probably some other parts of the English-speaking world. A quick check of Wikipedia suggests…

Portuguese name weekdays by numbers ex Monday, Segunda-feira (Second Market), but I don't think anyone assumes Sunday as the first day. And I leave the "market" for someone who still didn't have enough of this rabbit hole.

Russian is similar to Portuguese, albeit off by one.

Monday = Segunda (second) = понедельник (start of the week)

Tuesday = Terça (third) = вторник (second)

Wednesday = Quarta (fourth) = среда (middle)

Thursday = Quinta (fifth) = Четверг (fourth)

Friday = Sexta (sixth) = пятница (fifth)

So I guess Russians have no doubt as to when the week starts.

Re: Someday aliens will land and all will be fine until we explain our calendar

#330

Post by Quekid5 »

adhesive_wombat wrote: post #293
layer8 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a ring buffer, you have a start and an end pointer, not two end pointers.

If we think of it like iterators in C++, though, begin() is Monday, and end() is the next Monday.

One-past-the-end is the way.
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