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

Timekeeping Before Clocks

worldhistory.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 81 posts

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#41

Post by antognini »

loppink wrote: post #7
keiferski wrote: post #3

Another interesting thing is how Western clock technology was adapted to fit traditional Japanese notions of time, in the pre-Meiji era (after which, Japan adopted Western time.) A Japanese clock (和時計, wadokei) is a mechanical clock that has been made to tell traditional Japanese time, a system in which daytime and nighttime are always divided into six periods whose lengths consequently change with the season. Mechan…

There is a scene in that recent shogun series where a team performs a raid. The leader sends the team in in small waves and “times” each groups entrance by counting rhythmic taps on his shoulder. I thought it was such a great detail to include. Of course rhythm would be the measure of time without a watch to look at.

Reminds me of how the Pueblo leader Popé distributed ropes with knots tied in them to various groups across the region to coordinate his attack. Every day each group would untie one knot in their rope, and when all the knots were untied they were to attack the Spanish.

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#42

Post by crdrost »

renlo wrote: post #39

Not to be pedantic but I was genuinely confused by this statement: > He lived and wrote in the late 200s and early 100s BCE Shouldn't this instead be phrased as: > He lived and wrote in the early 200s and late 100s BCE He was born in 254 BCE and died in 184 BCE, he lived from the mid 200s BCE, started writing in the _early_ 200s BCE, and died in the _late_ 100s BCE.

No. The English terms "earlier" and "later" refer to the progression of time from the past (earlier) towards the present and future (later); they do not refer to the number itself being larger except incidentally. (The etymologies here are that "earlier" comes from "ere" meaning "before" or "soon", "later" comes from various "lat-" roots meaning "sluggish" or "lazy" hence starting after their appointed time.)

So for example the Wikipedia article on Hellenistic Palestine contains the opening line,

> The region came first under Ptolemaic rule beginning in the late 4th century BCE with Ptolemy I Soter, followed by Seleucid rule beginning in the early 2nd century BCE with Antiochus III the Great.

It then clarifies that the events of the late 4th century BCE include events in ~320 BCE, and that the early 2nd century stuff happened in ~198 BCE. This is a standard usage of those terms "early" and "late" as applied to those centuries, the 4th (400 BCE - 301 BCE) and 2nd (200 BCE - 101 BCE).

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#43

Post by antognini »

swatcoder wrote: post #40
WalterBright wrote: post #17

I sometimes watch those TV shows about ancient civilizations. They often talk about "astonishing" astronomy they used. In reality, all they did was track the sun. This can be done simply by putting a vertical stick in the ground, and marking the path the tip of the stick traces in the ground. This way, the calendar and solstices can be accurately determined. The shows will also talk about the "amazing" technology tha…

> They still had no idea what the sun, moon, and planets were, The composition of celestial bodies is useless trivia until you have some very modern material and energy sciences that might start turning to them for inspiration. There will almost certainly be a collapse of the modern world, and losing that information will be the very very least of our problems. > nor even the layout of the solar system. Depending on…

Also worth noting that pretty much every ancient civilization ended up figuring out the order of the planets, at least relative to earth. (It turns out not to be so difficult since this is directly related to their sidereal periods.)

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#44

Post by renlo »

crdrost wrote: post #42
renlo wrote: post #39

Not to be pedantic but I was genuinely confused by this statement: > He lived and wrote in the late 200s and early 100s BCE Shouldn't this instead be phrased as: > He lived and wrote in the early 200s and late 100s BCE He was born in 254 BCE and died in 184 BCE, he lived from the mid 200s BCE, started writing in the _early_ 200s BCE, and died in the _late_ 100s BCE.

No. The English terms "earlier" and "later" refer to the progression of time from the past (earlier) towards the present and future (later); they do not refer to the number itself being larger except incidentally. (The etymologies here are that "earlier" comes from "ere" meaning "before" or "soon", "later" comes from various "lat-" roots meaning "sluggish" or "lazy" hence starting after their appointed time.) So for…

I think the issue primarily is that there are two frames of reference used: "earlier" / "later" terms use the absolute frame of reference (time progressing forward), the numerical terms ("100s" / "4th century") are relative to the common era (higher BCE numbers mean further back in time).

To me it is confusing that they've mixed the two, even though it is convention to do so.

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#45

Post by shagie »

kjkjadksj wrote: post #24
russfink wrote: post #15

Often we wonder what distinguishes humans from other animals. Measurement and optimization. Do other species measure, and optimize? Others use tools, but do they optimize?

How would you define optimization? As in time management? Making some process take less effort perhaps? I’d say my cat fits the bill. She seems to have a better sense of time and keeping to her schedule than I do. She has also figured out many optimizations for her life that make sense to her. For example her path routing ability while running full speed is pretty amazing, she manages to figure out routes that keep h…

> I’d say my cat fits the bill. She seems to have a better sense of time and keeping to her schedule than I do.

https://www.tiktok.com/@donna.aka.donna/video/72142513818073...

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#46

Post by hammock »

Court of the Lions (14th c.) in the Alhambra palace is my favorite water clock.

A large pool of water is surrounded by 12 lions that would spout water from their mouths and depending on the hour of the day (1 o'clock, 2 o'clock, etc), the water comes from Lion 1, Lion 2, Lion 3, etc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Court_of_the_Lions

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#47

Post by jrussino »

swatcoder wrote: post #40
WalterBright wrote: post #17

I sometimes watch those TV shows about ancient civilizations. They often talk about "astonishing" astronomy they used. In reality, all they did was track the sun. This can be done simply by putting a vertical stick in the ground, and marking the path the tip of the stick traces in the ground. This way, the calendar and solstices can be accurately determined. The shows will also talk about the "amazing" technology tha…

> They still had no idea what the sun, moon, and planets were, The composition of celestial bodies is useless trivia until you have some very modern material and energy sciences that might start turning to them for inspiration. There will almost certainly be a collapse of the modern world, and losing that information will be the very very least of our problems. > nor even the layout of the solar system. Depending on…

> There will almost certainly be a collapse of the modern world

I hope your certainty is misplaced; this is just about the most horrifying prediction I can imagine.

As far as I can tell, we're at a particularly precarious transition point with regard to how much energy we consume. If society "collapses" before hitting some technological checkpoint we don't get to try again - at least, not for a looong time - because we've nearly used up all of the low-hanging fruit in the planet's energy resources (fossil fuels).

Re: Timekeeping Before Clocks

#50

Post by SoftTalker »

throw0101d wrote: post #37
vbezhenar wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> John Harrison was a carpenter by trade who was self-taught in clock making. During the mid-1720s he designed a series of remarkable precision longcase clocks. These clocks achieved an accuracy of one second in a month, far better than any clocks of the time. Wow. I own Tissot and Casio hand clocks and both are significantly worse precision. Are there any available clocks with that precision? Of course with GPS, WiF…

> Are there any available clocks with that precision? Citizens says ±1s/year with their Caliber 0100: * https://www.citizenwatch-global.com/the-citizen/lineup/cal01... * https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/citizen-eco-drive-caliber-... Solar powered as well. It should be noted that Harrison's watches were low-volume productions, so could be tuned very accurately—and their accuracy was a matter of life and death for shi…

> Being 1 minute off in time throws off distance by 15 nautical miles

I'm surprised that the accuracy of a hand-held sextant used while standing on a rolling/pitching deck is good enough for that to matter very much.

Post reply on HN