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Metric Time

metric-time.com

171–180 of 343 posts

Re: Metric Time

#171
While metric time has some appeal, I think it is not ambitious enough.

Base 10 is not good. 10 just does not have enough factors, so we are left to deal with complex fractions. Let's instead use base-12 numerals and keep time unchanged!

In base 12, 1 year is 10 months (or 265 days), 1 day is 20 hours, 1 hour is 50 minutes and a minute is 50 seconds.

Easy enough!

Edit: wait! I just realized this is still not ambitious enough!!!

What we need is to halve seconds in two. So, in base 12: 1 day = 10 hours, 1 hour = 100 minutes, 1 minute = 100 new seconds.

Re: Metric Time

#172

I'm a big fan of decimal time (or French Revolutionary Time as it's sometimes called). I made my own version a few years back: https://kybernetikos.github.io/UIT/ My version also removes timezones. The numeric time is the same whereever you are in the world, but the display changes based on your location so that local solar midday is straight up on the clock face and local solar midnight is straight down on the clock…

Is there a quarter day at the end of the year?

Re: Metric Time

#173
post #154
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely a better name

Metric time is a better name, since it states that this time comes naturally from our common metric system, and something is very very off that we don't use it.

Yes but it doesn't since it does not use the same second. So it is misleading

Re: Metric Time

#174

I'm a big fan of decimal time (or French Revolutionary Time as it's sometimes called). I made my own version a few years back: https://kybernetikos.github.io/UIT/ My version also removes timezones. The numeric time is the same whereever you are in the world, but the display changes based on your location so that local solar midday is straight up on the clock face and local solar midnight is straight down on the clock…

Is there a quarter day at the end of the year?

No because its a humane rather than scientific system. Day lengths in a scientific time vary, but in this system the hours are defined to be 10ths of a solar day so they vary as the day varies. Scientific measurement should be done with a different system. I'd suggest something based on the speed of light.

Re: Metric Time

#175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is the author thought this was an original idea, and just named it “metric” since that usually means some form of base-10 measurement.

No "metric" units means they are derived from the meter. Originally, most units in the SI systems were derived from the meter.

A cube of water 1cm * 1cm * 1cm = 1cm^3 has a mass of 1 gram. A cube of water 1m * 1m * 1m is 1000 liters and has a mass of 1000 kg

The SI units are supposed to be related like that.

Re: Metric Time

#176
post #173
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Metric time is a better name, since it states that this time comes naturally from our common metric system, and something is very very off that we don't use it.

Yes but it doesn't since it does not use the same second. So it is misleading

[deleted]

Re: Metric Time

#177
post #108
post #74

I love how the example is super confusing. You sleep 3.33… metric hours. You fall asleep 9:50 metric time. You'd think we can just interchange the . and : so you should wake up 12:83…, or 2:83… the next day. But no, it's apparently 2:75 metric time. Why? Also nice how they IMMEDIATELY ran into a continuing fraction 1/3, which is exactly the point of the 60-minute hour, 24-hour day, or 360-degree circle: lots of facto…

Come to think of it, being able to cleanly divide a minute or an hour into 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 equal parts is pretty damn handy.

Now apply the same logic to measurement, and you'll see why it's so handy to use a dozenal foot for fabricating things.

Re: Metric Time

#178
post #173
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Metric time is a better name, since it states that this time comes naturally from our common metric system, and something is very very off that we don't use it.

Yes but it doesn't since it does not use the same second. So it is misleading

[deleted]

Re: Metric Time

#179
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, a very confusing error. The metric time is the SI time (24h 60m 60s). The decimal time is base 10. French tried to get it used during the revolution and it did not work. Its the only unit that resisted decimalization, with a couple others ones in a handful of countries still using something called « imperial units ». Another similar thought experiment is binary clocks which I remember using to get use to read in…

>with a couple others ones in a handful of countries still using something called « imperial units ». The only country I know of offhand that uses "imperial units" is the UK. There's a different, but similar (and sometimes overlapping) system called "US Customary Units" that's used in the US. Imperial pints and gallons are NOT the same as US pints and gallons.

Thanks ! Sorry I overlooked this. Did a little research and I think the most confusing in this is the ton. At least, pints, gallons and miles have a different name than the metric unit and are way different than their SI equivalent. Not close by around 10%, one more (the long ton) and one less (the short ton). A perfect way to get the wrong quantity of a thing without noticing it at first. And if that’s not confusing enough, using « long » and « short » for a mass unit..

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonne

Re: Metric Time

#180
post #173
post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Metric time is a better name, since it states that this time comes naturally from our common metric system, and something is very very off that we don't use it.

Yes but it doesn't since it does not use the same second. So it is misleading

I don't think it is misleading. Although there is a name-collision with the SI time system that some people call metric time [0] already. I don't know how many people, or how official it is. I'll probably keep calling decimal time metric time, and we'll see if there is a real collision/confusion/misleading.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_time

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