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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

#511

Post by haswell »

_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…

The thing that would've brought it around for me is a punchline where the alien says something like "wow, your system is so clean and simple compared to ours".

I do think there's a certain degree of humor when looking back at history. There are plenty of things to laugh at in hindsight. But the thing that rubs me wrong is the undertone that this is somehow a distinctly human trait or inherently a bad thing. That somehow only humanity is subject to the impact of evolution and gradual learning over time.

And to those complaining that we should just have fun with this, I get it. There's some funny stuff in there. But that shouldn't absolve the thread of criticism. It's fair to point out that it's a pretty reductionist take when combined with the implication that humans are uniquely stupid. It's an easy problem to solve with a very slight reframing. $0.02.

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

#512

Post by eyelidlessness »

irrational wrote: post #314
eyelidlessness wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, the standard US weekend is Saturday–Sunday, even amongst the Sunday=1 holdouts. I say holdouts, because it helps to understand that this isn’t agreed on even within the US. Not to suggest that the holdouts are a minority, I honestly don’t know but I doubt it. I think, apart from the initial puzzlement of recognizing the inconsistency, most of us don’t give much thought at all to which day is 1. “Weekend” generall…

No. It starts from the creation story where creation starts on Sunday and ends on Friday and then the seventh day (Saturday) is the day of rest - the sabbath. You are thinking of how Jesus is said to resurrect on the first day of the week (I.e., Sunday) and later that becomes the Sabbath day for (most) Christians.

Thank you for the additional detail about the origin of Sunday as a sabbath, and the nuance that it’s not observed on Sunday by all Christians. I was not actually thinking about the resurrection story, or even about how Sunday came to be observed as such, but it led to some interesting reading.

I've found it hard to search for details of this aspect of labor history because results are almost entirely about the movement for, and details of, what came after: the 8 hour workday. But my understanding is still that Sunday was historically the conventional rest day in the US (at least for workers who could enjoy a rest day at all), regardless of the history of the traditional Jewish/pre-Christian/Restorationist sabbath observed on Saturday. The best source I’ve found so far[1] doesn’t explicitly say so, but does strongly suggest that Saturday came later as a recognized day off because the competing “weekend” equivalent spanned Sunday–Monday (I’m also fascinated to have learned about Saint Monday). I’m sure there are other sources to find, but I’m going to leave it here to enjoy the remainder of my rest day/weekend/first day of the week.

1: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200117-the-modern-phe...

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

#513

Post by nicoburns »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #491
lolinder wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It looks like there's a legend that this was the case, but January has been the first month of the year through all of recorded history, and Julius Caesar's version was no different. EDIT: Because there's a lot of confusion in several replies I thought I'd clarify: February was the second month in Julius Caesar's calendar. Romans in the Republic describe the month as being at some point the last month in the calendar…

> but January has been the first month of the year through all of recorded history Are you kidding? Not only are September through December literally named "Month 7" through "Month 10", but the year began in late March as recently as AD 1751. That is not a period where we're suffering from a lack of recorded history.

September through December being months 7 to 10 are because Julius Caesar (July) and Augustus Caesar (August) added months named after themselves after they were named.

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

#514

Post by marcosdumay »

cabaalis wrote: post #489
narag wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Chesterton's fence seems to apply here.

Hum, no. There is no reason not to change it (except for inertia, what is a better reason than any you will see). It is logical (once you get over the fixation with 60), but none of that logic is a good reason to keep it.

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

#515

Post by thaumasiotes »

nicoburns wrote: post #513
thaumasiotes wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but January has been the first month of the year through all of recorded history Are you kidding? Not only are September through December literally named "Month 7" through "Month 10", but the year began in late March as recently as AD 1751. That is not a period where we're suffering from a lack of recorded history.

September through December being months 7 to 10 are because Julius Caesar (July) and Augustus Caesar (August) added months named after themselves after they were named.

No, that never happened. They renamed the existing months "5" and "6".

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

#517

Post by lvxferre »

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.

> I don't think anyone assumes Sunday as the first day.

That is not up to assumptions, but to conventions and arbitrariness. You find both conventions among Portuguese speakers, but mostly domingo/Sunday as the first day of the week.

A good way to check this is to websearch pictures for "calendário em português", and look for the first column of the calendar. Most will have D/Dom (domingo/Sunday); however a large minority will have S/Seg (segunda-feira/Monday) instead.

>And I leave the "market" for someone who still didn't have enough of this rabbit hole.

It's mostly a fossilised meaning.

Latin "feriae" originally meant holidays, holy days, vacations, and the likes; that's why the clergy¹ chose "feria" for the weekdays, as you'd be praising their god instead of the Pagan gods². However, already in Late Latin, this backformation also meant "fair"³. In Portuguese that second meaning eventually evolved to "street market", likely due to influence of the names of the days of the week - you don't work in domingo/Sunday or sábado/Saturday, but you gotta work and sell stuff in the "dias de feira" (feira days).

1. This clergy intervention was done in Latin. This is visible for the name of Tuesday being terça-feira ← tertia feria instead of *terceira feira (third holy day).

2. The traditional names for Monday to Friday were lues, martes, mércores, joves, vernes. Ecclesiastical interference got rid of the names for Sunday and Saturday early on, but if Portuguese inherited the Roman names they'd be something like "soes" and "sadurnes" respectively.

3. In fact that's where English got the word "fair" from. At least when it comes to those fancy markets/exhibitions/etc.; not to be confused with the homophone "fair" for just, beautiful, etc., as this one is native and unrelated.

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

#518

Post by marcosdumay »

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.

> but I don't think anyone assumes Sunday as the first day.

You can get any calendar from a Portuguese speaking country to see they do.

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

#519

Post by wolfv »

The 6*6*10 calendar is regular as possible. It has 6 months per year, 6 weeks per month, 10 days per week.

One month:

00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29

30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39

40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59

60

Every month ends with a blank day (60), with the exception of the last month in non-leap years.

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

#520

Post by ClumsyPilot »

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…

just because something has historical reasons does mean it makes sence today. There is no reason for the Moon to have any place in a modern calendar.

You already have 2 values: year and day, and they do not divide nicely. But they serve a practical purpose in a modern society, so we have to deal with them. The moon does not, but adds a third factor.

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