Does anyone stay up to watch their Atomic Clocks move forward? Is it like seeing in the new year? :lol:

Technology is not the problem. The problem was Congress that simply changed the 'time change' date. Then technology does not change times properly for two weeks.

Worse, the Congress that made that change did so for political reasons - not for any reason based in science.

Not that the time change itself has any scientifically valid reasoning behind it.

I guess that's why I doubted my clocks: since it was moved up I didn't know if my clocks would "know." Someone must have told them, because they updated just fine.

I'm curious, though, what were the political reasons? I think DST started for the farmers, right? Well, that's what I've heard though I don't know why that would be either...farmers run their big machines all night around these parts.

When I was a kid, everyone used to blame it on the farmers, but I think that's an urban myth. Farmers are the one profession that doesn't do anything by the clock. They follow signals given to them by mother nature, not by some central governmental organization saying that this particular moment in time is called this particular number. They milk the cows when the udders are full. They plant when the temperature is right. They harvest when the crops are mature.


I have no idea why we do this crazy clock changing bs, but according to wikipedia:

Heh...that makes sense. That's what I thought about the farmers too...they work all day and night anyway.

So I'm curious as to what the political motivations were (in tw's view) as to why it was moved up earlier this year? Who decides that? What benefits occurred and for whom?

This is something I never would have thought much about before: inquiring minds want to know. :)

What's really interesting to me is the way the time zone maps are drawn. Looking at the two extremes of the Eastern Time zone, the sun rose in Lubec Maine today at 6:40 AM, and it rose in Ontonagon Michigan in the Upper Peninsula at 8:10 AM. That's an hour and a half difference in the start of daylight hours, and they are in the same time zone. So this DST can be really helpful for some locations and really bad for others. I bet Maine is pretty happy about it, and Michigan is bummed. Last week, Maine had tons of early morning light and it was pitch black in the late afternoon, and now it's more balanced. Michigan had a decent balance and now they are dark in the morning and have a lot of light in the afternoon and early evening.

I'm glad that the fall back was changed - there's now more light for trick-or-treating.

...and we all know which political party gets more donations from the kiddies and their trick-or-treating. ;)

UNICEF?

Right. Grrr. Now we're back to sending the kids to school in the dark and they have to go to bed in the light (in theory)

hmmmph. tw isn't answering my question. Maybe I'll put it in the technology thread. ;)

Yoohoooooo, tw?

I thought I heard a dicking sound.

Nature gave me a hand with the time change. My power went out on Saturday afternoon around 1630 because of storms, and didn't come back on until the wee hours. All of my electronic clocks went into power failure mode and I had to completely reset them the next morning. I did remember to reset my watch before bed, at least.

The original purpose of daylight savings was pioneered back in Franklin's time. It had a purpose; getting people out and about earlier when the sun was up earlier. However the latest time change (three weeks earlier) had no basis in science. It was promoted in Congress on some non-peer reviewed conclusion from some professor. Politicians bought into the myth for reasons similar to why consumers buy surge protectors. Advantages of daylight savings time are lost when implemented too close to winter. Implementing daylight savings time three weeks earlier was not based in any science.

Politicians were just knowing without first learning facts (just like Saddam's WMDs). It was proposed on wild speculation that it would save energy. Some research says it saved a trivial amount of energy. Other research says it increased energy consumption. IOW it had no science purpose. Was implemented by politicians making decisions on their feelings - not by using facts. That is called myth in markets. And politics in Congressional chambers. Same politics that said Saddam had WMDs. When myths are more important than reality.

Political motivation at this point was to do something for no useful purpose. I don't know which (if any) politicians got rich on this.

BTW, time zones are determined by an agency of the Interior department. Indiana is on east coast time except a small region near Chicago. Some areas do not use daylight savings time. A county near the time zone border can appeal to the Feds to be moved from one time zone to the other or be exempted from daylight saving time.