“At least we’re not mixing in letters”
I see
IIIIin there and I cry a little on the inside.This has become a standard on analog clocks and watches (presumably to avoid confusion with VI), but for some reason IX and XI (for 9 and 11 respectively) is fine.
Personally I’d like to see IX and IIIIIIIIIII.
ETA: I guess IX and XI are ‘fine’ because they’re not upside down, but my point still stands.
At least we’re not mixing in letters
Zulu Time: Am I a joke to you?
For some reason I heard this in a combination of the voices of Mitch Hedberg, and Nate Bargatze as George Washington.
At least our hours are the same length regardless of latitude now, so let’s be grateful for that.
oh god, thanks for making me imagine something terrible
IIRC they counted the bones in their fingers using their thumb and that gives 12. The first sundial was around the equator and there is always light for half a day, so half a day becomes 12 hours.
To count large numbers often one hand was used to count using 5 fingers and the other to count the bones, so you get 5x12 for 60 minutes.
AIUI there was an aspect in the divisibility of the numbers being convenient.
12 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, and 6. 60 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30.
10 is divisible by 2 and 5. 100 is divisible by 2, 4, 5, 10, 20, 25, and 50.
If you want to minimize dealing with fractions, 12 and 60 are far more convenient than 10 and 100.
That’s an interesting thought, but I believe it to simply be a coincidence.
The base 12 counting being based on counting the division of your fingers is historically verified, but if the division aspect was so compelling to them you’d expect it to carry forward into their writing system.
By the time you get cuneiform math though, they actually go back to base 10.
https://images.app.goo.gl/9GR6VEiT7GHYF3KaA
As you can see base 12 is not in the written system, or for written mathematics. It just was convenient for counting on their hands.
They used mixes of base 10/base 12 and base 60.
Base 10 would be used go determine the symbols for a specific “digit” in base 60.
So similar to how our 13 is 1 ten and 3 ones, their 13 was the symbol for 10 then 3 symbols for 1. 13 = 𒌋𒁹𒁹𒁹 But 73 would be written 𒁹 𒌋𒁹𒁹𒁹
Which would be interpreted as 1 sixty and 13 ones, or 60 + 13
I’ma start a revolution where we use duodecimal metric for everything, including time.
That’s how we ended up with 12 months of varying length in a year and it’s a mess.
It’s a problem no matter how you divide the year
That’s why I propose changing the orbit of the earth, too
13 months of 4 weeks + new year’s day (+leap day) actually fits perfectly.
I wouldn’t call having an unassigned remainder “perfectly”. And always, leap day fucking shit up lol
Not if you divide by 5. It gets you 73 days each.
Ok, but now subdivide the 73 day month-analogs into week-analogs.
I can see calling the month analogs “seasons”, but 73 is a prime number so you’re boned. We need subdivisions smaller than that for practical purposes
The french:
Goddamn metric time
Even the French figured out that decimalized time was stupid after a couple of years.
Which has added credence to the old saying that “The French follow no one. And no one follows the French.”
Why is it stupid beyond, “nobody else uses it”?
Well, beyond the sheer social resistance to the idea. Turns out everyone needs to agree it’s a great idea and almost no one did. Evidently humans are wired to the base12 time format far better.
The attempt at switching to base10 time quickly fell apart when people started notice that the the “time markers” were starting to drift. And at some point they finally figured out that what we call “noon” was going drift rather quickly to not happening until evening and therefore Monday was going to move to a different spot also. This is a very bad thing. Because any kind of calendaring system needs to be as consistent as possible. Noon must happen at the same point in the day every day or as close to it as it it can mathematically get. If it drifts to fast and far, then it’s a worthless marker for time. And decimal time has that problem in spades.
Now, no calendar system is perfect because the orbits of the planets in our solar system isn’t perfectly consistent. Sometimes the orbit of earth is a tiny bit faster or sometimes it’s a tiny bit slower. So we strive to get a close as we can but we still need to make adjustments. Turns out, all that math is really bloody hard.
??? That’s not how it worked at all.
They still had the same length of time per day; 24 hours was equal to 10 french hour, each french hour was 100 french minutes, and each french minute was 100 french seconds. So noon arrived at 5 every day.
I kinda want to try it out lol
Why the ‘IIII’ insted of ‘IV’?
Prevents confusion between the four and the six: III, IV, V, VI, when the watch is not held perfectly vertically for viewing.
Actually very common in watches with roman numbers iirc
i’m pretty sure that IV is a modern typographic thing
I’ve also heard that, because in Latin IV is the beginning of “IVPPITER” (Jupiter), there’s a theory that people avoided using “IV” as to not “disrespect” the god’s name. 🤷♀️
Also, on a 12 hour clock, 3 sets of four looks clean af I guess, e.g.:
- I, II, III, IIII
- V, VI, VII, VIII
- IX, X, XI, XII
Since the IIII usage is common in the Middle Ages and even into the Early Modern Period, when nobody believed in Jupiter, that is obviously just something somebody made up.
It could have also started from that and continued on despite people not knowing the reason, no? I do agree that it’s quite silly and unlikely, though.
May as well just go with VIIII then. Or maybe 9.
IIIIIIIII
Now I really want a .beats watch. That’s so retro cool.
If you’re ok with a screwdriver, you can mod a Casio F91-W and add a .beat watchface https://www.sensorwatch.net/docs/watchfaces/clock/#beat-time
Why does everything that comes from Switzerland always seem to be owned by Swatch? Do they not have any other brands there?
Swatch is the largest watch company in the world and you’ll be surprised which brands are owned by them. Omega for example
If the day started at 1:00 then by the second hour you would be at 2:00, even though only 1 hour has passed. Effectively the day starts at 0. In fact in 24-hour time that is how it’s depicted, 00:00 with midday being depicted as 12:00, so it isn’t confusing
Careful, there are Americans around
Americans love units based on 12
In the roman empire the day/night cycle was divided into 24 segments. 12 for the day and 12 for the night which also meant a day hour in summer was longer than the night hour.
If the day started at 1:00 then by the second hour you would be at 2:00, even though only 1 hour has passed.
When the second day of the month starts, the day of the month is 2, even though only 1 day has passed.
I mean, numerically it does make sense to start at zero but it doesn’t seem to correspond to the way people think and talk.
Feel free to take it up with the Romans. It’s their stupid calendar system.
I also take issue with there being 7 days in a week rather than 10, it’s just messy.
As a programmer I’d rather it start at 0
Yeah but now you can’t enjoy the delights of python
Which is also why I hate that our calendar starts at year 1.
I only recently learned the etymology of the word: “second”
Its name comes from being the “second” division of the hour, with the minute being the first.
I’ll see you in 5 firsts, 2 seconds and 7 thirds.
Zero zeros?
I honestly hate this.
It’s like bad world building for some throwaway fiction story.
It’s funny how we go straight to metric when dividing seconds
Days start at 0h, not 12h
It can’t start at 12 hours if there are 24 segments.
And keep your letters out of it too.
Days start at 0h, not 12h
Show me where is the zero here?
I have a clock that has 0 at the bottom, 6 in the 9 position, 12 at the top, and 18 in the 3 position.
I present to you… the binary clock
That’s fantastic and I want one, but it’s a BCD clock. Binary would say 01100 001111 101101
The AM/PM bullshit:
AM: 12, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11
Then the same for PM. Who counts like that? Whats after 12? 1! What?
The galaxy-brained group known as “Z12 + 1”. “What if we did modular arithmetic but one-indexed.”
Edit: Actually, wait, it’s worse: zero-indexing but we represent the zero element in Zn as ‘n’. Kill it with fire.
Is not 12+12Z the exact same coset as 0+12Z? Is 12 not the identity element? Must group theory follow computer science conventions?
People who lived before the invention of zero counted like that!
I have no idea if that’s true but I believe it
The idea of zero being a number rather than the absence of a number took a very long time to settle on. There’s a whole history book on the topic!
I listened to an audiobook about the history of zero years ago (can’t remember the name, might be that one). I thought it would be dull enough to fall asleep to.
It was not.
Big brain ape like count in many systems
What clocks do you have that say 0, except for the 0 in 10?
Digital ones.
… what digital clock goes clockwise?
Well I can tell you that mine definitely doesn’t go anti-clockwise
Mine just goes south
European ones
Fair enough
Clocks should use 24h format. AM/PM is completely useless.
No it’s not, with a 12h format on an analog watch you can use the sun to find true north. It is also easier to read it when the hands have double the amount of degrees to indicate the number.
Edit – digital watches should use 24h, I fully agree, maybe there was a misunderstanding because it’s analog watches we’re talking about here and these could stay 12h IMHO
How do you find north on a 12h face that wouldn’t work with a 24h face? Because the method I know, requires correcting for the 12h circle.
Yeah, that’s the method I know.
Divide the angle that is made in half
And that’s how you correct for the 12h face.
Thought as much but never had any experience with 24h watches, so no comment on this from my side :)
deleted by creator
No, no comment in the sense of I have no experience with 24h watches so I cannot comment on them regarding this topic. If others have experience they might add their share, which they did.
With a 24h watch, you line up the hour hand with the sun. Because the sun does a full circle in 24h and the hour hand does the same, lining them up will always make 24 point north (on the northern hemisphere).
A compass is still the better option, because the magnetic field also points north in the southern hemisphere and doesn’t have to be recalibrated when you move too far east or west.
How the heck do you find north based on your watch? I’m pretty good at knowing where north in based on where I am.
I live in north Manchester so I know Manchester is south. Or I can look at the sun if not midday and figure it out.
How the heck do you find north based on your watch?
I live in north Manchester so I know Manchester is south
What if you go on a trip to Thailand and get turned around in the jungle?
Or I can look at the sun if not midday and figure it out
That gives you a very approximate direction.
It’s the same method.
The distance between the sun and 12 is divided by two, because the clock face only shows half the day.
If we had a clock with 24 hours in the circle and used the same method, it’d be the same as pointing at the sun and saying: South is where the sun will be at noon.
Thanks.
I don’t generally go places like that, but if I needed to be aware of north I would take a compass.
Still good information though.
It’s useless in the jungle, as you can’t see the sun.
You don’t need to stare directly into the ball of fire to determine where the Sun is. All you need is the flashes of light through the leaves - and you CAN see that in the jungle.
I have never seem a 24h wrist watch (I know they exist) aside from extremely seldom as wall clocks
I’ve looked for them, but they’re very hard to find and expensive too. You can’t just slap a 24h face on a 12h mechanism, so it’s all custom and produced in low volumes. (I think it’s technically possible to convert a 12h period into 24h by switching out a single gear, but that might ruin your minute hand too? I’m no clock maker.)
They don’t have to be expensive, though such watches are less popular for everyday use. In fact I’m wearing a Vostok Kommendurski with a 12/24 hour dial. When I was a medic, I needed to record all my times in 24hr format on my run reports. I think I paid $35US delivered from Russia 15 or so years ago.
And no extra gear is needed to make an analog watch/clock indicate 24 hour time. Time doesn’t change. You simple have one scale that reads from 12AM through 12PM and then at the next hour, (1PM) it simply gets renumbered to 13, 14, 15, 16 and so on until you reach 24 on the inside scale. Easy peasey.
But it is possible to build a watch/clock that the movement does move in 24 hour time and you would be correct it would a couple of extra gears to accomplish. But, it would also be a real pain to create a legible watch face with all those numbers on a reasonable sized watch. Far simpler and easier to print the two scales on the face and call it good.
You paid $35 for the watch, the delivery or both? Because I saw those Vostok watches with proper 24h faces, which is exactly what I’m looking for, but they’re $140. I guess that’s not super expensive for a watch, but I can get a much nicer 12h watch for that money.
And a double numbered clock face is the simple solution, probably more convenient to read, but also not really a conversation starter :)
Vostok Komandirskie
I paid $35 delivered from Russia. And honestly, I do not remember if that was a sale price or not because it’s been enough years ago now.Despite all the cheap quartz watches found in Walmart, $140 really isn’t all that much for a properly made manual wind watch these days. Even a plastic Timex will set you back nearly $120 for a quartz LCD with 24 hour display and only one choice of looks. So I probably wouldn’t consider the price out of line for the Komandirski with multiple choices available.
A Bespoke 24 hour mechanical movement would be quite the piece of horology art. A conversation started indeed.
It sounds like a joke but I really had someone stop me on the street to ask for the time and when I said 2:30 they asked “AM or PM?” I guess a 24 hour clock would’ve prevented that.
Don’t listen to OP’s bullshit.
They work for big clock. They’re trying to convince you 12 hour clock is useless so they can sell you double the clock.
Look at this guy, only one clock. I keep two analog clocks in each room, the AM 12-11, and PM 12-11. The way it was meant to be.
Wouldn’t you need half the clock if it had twice the numbers?
Somebody never had a clock with roman numerals and it shows
I remember getting into an argument with a grade school teacher over IIII because most such clocks put that for 4 instead of IV because of some fuckin reason
I despise these so so much. IIII was historically NEVER correct. Some doofus decided to put that on a clock because it looks more symmetrical with the VIII on the other side. Terrible reasoning.
IIII was the way Romans usually wrote 4. It’s associated with simplicity / illiteracy. But also depended on era, region, intended audience, or practicality. I think the most famous example is the coliseum using LIIII.
There’s still variation even now; standardization is relatively new, and it’s not common knowledge. And dates… it’s like every 50-100 years people decided to write them differently.
“However, even though it is now widely accepted that 4 must be written IV, the original and most ancient pattern for Roman numerals wasn’t the same as what we know today. Earliest models did, in fact, use VIIII for 9 (instead of IX) and IIII for 4 (instead of IV). However, these two numerals proved problematic, they were easily confused with III and VIII. Instead of the original additive notation, the Roman numeral system changed to the more familiar subtractive notation. However, this was well after the fall of the Roman Empire.”
https://monochrome-watches.com/why-do-clocks-and-watches-use-roman-numeral-iiii-instead-of-iv/
Weird, I’ve seen many analog clocks with Roman numerals but always IV for 4.
It’s actually called the “clockmakers four” or “watchmakers four.” it’s a thing.
Yeah I looked it up and saw it is a thing, and it’s interesting. I wonder if the clock I’m thinking of was just a really cheap one that was labeled as you’d expect based on Roman numerals or whether some just didn’t follow it.
To be fair, Google searching Roman numerals clocks give you about a 50/50 distribution.
I wasn’t aware of this either and I suspect we’re not alone. It’s not highly noticeable and if there’s a 50-50 chance won’t even see it…
False. I had a clock that used IIII instead.
Your clock having it doesn’t change that mine didn’t.
deleted by creator
Sundials.
Now if you want to get really pissed, the magnetic North Pole is actually the South Pole of the Earth’s magnetic field. We call it the North Pole because the north side of a magnet points to it.
Don’t tell them about positive/negative electron movement.
Actually, we call it the North Pole because we already had a concept of North from the North Star. Then we invented magnets and decided that the part that points North is the North side of a magnet (despite North Pole being magnetic south).
Where am I?? 🫨🌀😵💫
We have Babylon to thank for this
Our mistake was not embracing base-12 time, it was failing to embrace a base-12 counting system.
100% this.
Not true. You have math thank for that and there is a good reason for numbers like that (and why Babylonier used them). They are very useful to do calculations in your head, especially division because the have a lot of factors. The concept is called highly composite numbers (HCN) and superior highly composite numbers (SHCN). They are practically “anti-primes”. That’s why base-6 or base-12 are objectively a better number system than base-10 but it’s pretty much too late to switch now.
Damn that’s genius
And I thank them.
Somebody gave me this clock…I just need the time.
ten ten
piece of art
I have no issue reading this.
