because babylonians used base 60 so counted to 60 so there is 60 minutes in hour. That was question, why is there 24 hours in day was not the question so not answered
To put it as simple a possible, most cultures counted by fingers, while most of the rest counted by either the sections or joints of the fingers. If you ignore the thumb, that's 12, which is easily divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, 6 and 12, while 10 is easily divisible only by 1, 2, 5 and 10. With that, ask this: What's the lowest common denominator for 10 and 12? Turns out that's 60! And it can be divided by all those numbers, plus extras like 15, 20, 30. And truth be told, as large as 60 is, it's an extremely easy number to divide, cause you will use fractions a lot more than decimals :)
Base 12 - 60 is a very old counting system. It developed right alongside writing itself. You can see it in most any ancient system: 12 months, 24 hours, 24 karats to gold, 12 to a dozen. This explains it better than I can. www.quora.com/Why-do-clocks-have-12-hours As for why seconds are divided into 10ths instead of 60ths, it's because we've only had the technology to measure that small a division of time in very recent history.
Thanks for the responses, but the point of healthdios' comment is that I watched a 3 minute video that didn't adequately explain why there are 60 minutes in an hour. All I got was, "uh, it would be like hard to specify the exact time of day" and "60 has advantages." Excuse me, but how exactly would it be hard to be specific about the time of day in a base 10 system, and what advantages are there exactly to a base 60 system? Useless video is useless.
Jason Henley exactly, I was expecting to hear an specific reason with arguments on why 12 or 60 are used instead of a decimal system which has more practical applications and can be scientifically managed. ...it will probably require a major development worldwide to get all human systems lined up. ....maybe
Some constructive criticism: you need examples in your video. When you talk about how complicated it would be if we would use base 10 to measure all of time I kept expecting for number examples to show up on the empty green part of the screen next to you. Also with every other point that you make. You need to make the video a visual as well as audible experience. Hope you take this the right way and that it helps.
***** I agree they need to be some more explanation on their reasoning. There's a video by Numberphile about counting in Base 12 and why some Mathematicians consider it superior to base 10. One of the reasons I remember is because 12 has more divisors and so fractions would be easier to write out. My current theory about the use of 60 is that you can count to 12 on one hand: each of the 4 fingers has 3 knuckles on an average hand and with practice you can touch each knuckle with your thumb to keep track. You get done there and keep track of the repetitions on the other hand by slowly doing your preferred "count to 5" gestures. So 5 x 12 = 60.
+미셜비 Okay... The reason I brought up the knuckles was based on the Numberphile video. A common complaint about using base 12 instead of base 10 is that an average person only has 10 fingers, not 12. Using the fingers' knuckles, one can easily count to 12 on one hand. In the old times, someone could easily be counting things off in base 12 using their knuckles without getting lost. Then getting to 60 could be done having the other hand help keep track of the repetitions of 12. And since 5 x 12 is 60, that was my theory on why 60 was a common large number in the Sumerian system instead of 100.
+Nathan Chung He didn't explain it. Babylonians counted with their fingers differently then we do. They counted the knuckles on each finger (3) times 4 fingers which allowed them to count up to 12 on one hand. Then their other hand kept track of the multiples of 12. So counting up to 5 on the other hand would equal 60.
For those who didn't understand: 60 has more factors than 100 or 10 hence it would reduce the possibility of getting any Rediculous answers like 0.333 since in those days decimals weren't invented yet
I agree, he did not answer the question of 60 Minutes in an hour. He basically said we use 60 because it works better. I would like to know why 60 works better than 100.
Kevin Dunbar I will try to explain, but I'm bad at it, so watch "Base 12 - Numberphile" here on you tube for a great explanation. The reason is because base 60 has more factors. The best way to explain is to use base 12 as an example. in base 10 we have the numbers 0-9 to represent places in a number, so we count 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 then 10. In base 12 there are 12 characters say 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 X S where X = 10 and S = 11 in decimal. so the characters 10 in base twelve equals 12 in base ten. But why do this? well if i were to divide 1 by 3 my answer would be 0.33333... However, in base Twelve 1(which has a value of 12) divided by 3 would be .4 This is just one reason people argue for it being more efficient there are many more, so just watch the Video because I am a terrible teacher.
Robin Halligan in other words 1 is is divided into 12 point instead of 10 point. 0.1 in Dozinal does not equal 0.1 in Decimal Watch the video I Put in the previous comment.
3:30 OK a day 24 hours (12 + 12) x 60 x 60 = 86.400 seconds (x100) New time system: A day 10 hours (5 + 5) x 100 x 100 = 100.000 seconds (13.600 seconds would be included, so to use a decimal system seconds wil take 0,864 current seconds).
Well, there is a system of decimal time: The "day" is divided into 1000 "chrons". So, most people would sleep for 333 chrons (1/3 of a day... 8 hours), and perhaps work at a job for 333 chrons. Then, they'd have 334 chrons for other activities. And the chron could be sliced down into decicrhons, millichrons, micro chrons... however small an interval you might need to measure or specify. One chron is 86.4 seconds long, since there are 86,400 seconds in a day. Not counting those times when a leap second is added to make our clocks stay in sync with the rotation of the Earth.
Hey Gabriel. The podcast for BrainStuff has actually been re-runs of an older show. We recently changed distribution systems and I suspect it wasn't part of the transition. However, we're hoping to launch a brand new BrainStuff podcast in the future!
When I was in high school, I invented "decimal time" with 10 hours per day and 100 minutes per hour, etc. Then I wrote a Pascal program to convert "normal" time to my decimal time.
I don't think the video accurately describes why civilizations preferred 60 over 100. Distance measurements weren't standardized until the SI unit of meters was established and that uses base 10. So why wouldn't changing the calender or the day into a base 10 system not work out well? It seems like the answer is that humans just got used to it.
Yep. It would be funny it it wasn't sad that the entire HowStuffWorks site - one of my favorite sites when owned and maintained by Marshall Brain - turned into crappy not-so-great satire when he sold it.
Firestorm Yup, really.. And since most of the net is US based, we are living in a world where our real lives is logical and our virtual lives is fuzzy and complicated.. AM and PM is just the start of it. Majority of the videos you and i watch uses feets, miles, pounds and gallons making every quantitive measurement really unprecise as we try to do quick guestimation what is the length or weight of the things they talk about and we have to pause, rewind a LOT because one nation that considers itself the ruler of the world and is the powerhouse of internet can't turn to metric. Why? Because of false national pride, they think they will loose their unique perspective on life and will be turned to socialism if they used their heads.. What can we do about it? We can troll and bitch about it every chance we get.. That's what i do, point out how stupid it is and maybe, just maybe in 20 years time the whole planet uses the same units. We already (almost) talk the same language, which is more important than any economic decision or political system. Less division, more unity.
Yes but most of the entertainment and edutainment comes from good ole US of A. That is why it is important to talk about the moronic, boneheaded stubbornness fueled by misguided patriotism refusing to align with the rest of the world. Metric system and 24h clock are both much better, not to mention writing dates month/day/year that makes no sense what so ever. One troll at a time, maybe we can change it, at least it makes me fool good to have such an easy target to vent my bent up anger towards my own reality. Which is shitty, to say the least.
Probably the Romans favored duodecimal (base 12) system, but they also would like to incorporate the advance sexagesimal (base 60) of the Babylonians. Thus, they used 24 hours a day, 60 minutes an hour, and 60 seconds a minute. What do they have in common? They are all divisible by 12. In using these mixed unit systems they still use the decimal system, but this time as sub base in order to avoid forming additional single digit numerals greater than 9.
There may be a geometrical explanation. In order to measure the time, you have to observe the sky. The sky's basically a circle, which can easilly be divided by 6 or 12 or 60.
You're on to something. It takes the sun exactly four minutes to "move" the width of the solar disk. Say we don't know what a minute is and the basic unit of time is that which it takes the sun to move one solar disk. Careful observation there are exactly 360 SDs (solar disks) in one day. Chunking it up into useable pieces requires a number easily divisible into 360. Six, 12, and 60 work well. Ten gets clunky when dealing with 12s. If we had a base 12 numerical system, there would be 100 minutes in an hour. But those darned fingers distracted us. While the metric system was being developed, the French suggested a 10-hour day and a 100 minute hour (I've seen some of their metric watches in museums) but the idea never caught on and they gave up (again).
Not very informative. Try delving into the historical background a little more and using more visuals. Show and tell people why using '10' is bad rather than just saying it.
the decimal system wouldn't work for time unless you were to redefine the second. Divide the day into 10 parts to make a metric hour = 2.4 regular hours. Divide that into 10 metric minutes = 14.4 regular minutes. Divide a metric minute into 10 metric seconds = 86.4 regular seconds. so you would have to add more units of measure.
Main reason we kept dozenal or base 12 system in measuring time is simple, when a hour is 60 minutes long you can easily divide it in halves, thirds, quarters, fifths, sixth, tenths, twelves and so on if it was decimal you could only divide it in halves, quarters and fifths easily. And yes we have 10 fingers but we also have 12 knuckles on four fingers of each hand so its possible that they used knuckles while learning how to count.
Why would you like to divide the day in 6ths or 12ths and not in 5hts or 10ths? If you still want more divisor you can have easily 10ths, 15ths, 20ths, 30ths ...I still do not see the necessity of 12/24 hours instead of 50/100 hours.
60 minutes 60 seconds and don't forget 360 degrees in a circle. The real value of 60 is that it divides into many fractions. Ancient people did not have calculators. But they could use fractions. 60 can be split or factored by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 15, 30 (did I miss some?) So things like the decimal value for 1/6 which is .666666667 can be avoided. Decimals are useful sometimes, but fractions and ratios are easier to deal with.
Pet peeve: When some one says or writes "12PM" or "12AM." The precise moment of 12 o'clock is neither AM nor PM because it is the very moment that AM and PM are measuring how long before and after. The same reason that the number zero is neither positive nor negative.
Including PM or AM in it is a convenience matter. It is considered acceptable usage for that reason. By definition it is a paradox, but its still socially acceptable. If I told you "Be there at 12" you would be thoroughly confused. Did I mean Midnight or did I mean Noon? Ideally, you'd just want to use a 24-hour clock instead, but since most people will give you blank looks if you tell them to meet you for dinner at 1730.
***** Context clues. Common sense. Neighborbob is correct that using the notation is socially acceptable. I'm just pointing out that it's still incorrect. There are plenty of things that are accepted and wrong. I've accepted it, but I don't go around correcting every one I hear say it. It's just one of those little things that irks me when I hear it. I guess kind of like "daylight savings time."
Through tireless efforts and observations, ancient astronomers assessed that (approx.) 360 days were needed for the Earth to complete its circular orbit around the sun. This discovery is impressive given the rudimentary tools and techniques employed by many of those distant civilizations. Skip forward several thousand years into the future. We are still using 360 degrees (days) to represent a full circle (Earth's orbit around sun). And as others have mentioned, using 24 hours/day is handy because 24 factors into 360 evenly, as well as working smoothly with the other units of time (i.e. 60 mins/hour, 60 sec/min)
People keep saying we use base 10 because we have 10 fingers, and base 12 (or 60 which equals 5*12) because of our 12 knuckle bones apart from the thumb, as well as more integer divisors. I suggest other reasons. Mark a cross-hair on a sheet of paper, like a big "+" sign (in fact this may be the origin of the sign in math). Put a counter or small pebble in the top right quadrant. That represents 1. Move it down to the bottom right. That stands for 2, even though we've still only got one pebble. Across to bottom left, that's 3. Up to top left, that's 4. OK, we've now done as much as we can with just one pebble, so we introduce another and put it into the quadrant we started with, the top right. Those two pebbles in those two quadrants stand for 4 and 1 respectively, that is 5. Keep this system up till all four quadrants are occupied by one pebble each, and what we have stands for 10, which as we know decomposes into the four digits 1 2 3 4. Start a new "+" to continue counting. (Other configurations are possible of course, instead of the "+" we could have a figure with 5 or 3 compartments, but not so convenient). Why 12 clock divisions? Again fingers have nothing to do with it. 12 decomposes into 1 2 3 3 2 1, and amounts to double that number of digits, a convenient way of logging any natural cycle that involves a rise and a fall, such as tides.
@BrainStuff - HowStuffWorks, Hi at 0:30 you mention that, '..for some reason we divide our day into 24 parts.' The reason for this is a long time ago in the 19th Century, there was a committee of timekeepers who decided to have 24 different time zones based upon the railroad schedule, and that stuck ever since. Just thought you'd like to know...
24=1*2*3*4 10=1+2+3+4 6=1*2*3=1+2+3 60=3*4*5=(1+2+3)*(1+2+3+4) We have two hands: 1 thumb and four fingers with three parts each. So with one thumb we can touch twelve parts. We have two hands so 12 * 2 = 24. One round of four fingers with three parts each on one hand and five fingers on other hand. So 3*4*5=60
One theory I had why it was base sixty, is because you can actually count to sixty on your hands very easily. Using your dominate hand, use your thumb to count each (lack of a better word) segment on your fingers. Since each finger has three segments, and you're using your four fingers, you get a total of twelve. Once you reach twelve, you lift a finger on your non dominate hand, signifying one set of twelve. Since you have five fingers, you can go all the way up to sixty. I understand that technically, that is a base twelve, but still really cool! Example, I'm a lefty so I would count 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C. That would engage the next number column: 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 1A, 1B, 1C 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 2A, 2B, 2C etc. In base 10, A equals 10. B equals 11, C equals 12. However, the "11" in base 12, does not equal base 10's "11", it equals base 10's 14. Why? If I am not mistaken, when base "x" reaches the value of x, then it engages the next column. Like, base 5. Base 5 would count: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25 (skipping a few) 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 110 etc. BrainStuff - what do you think of that? Could you better explain it then I can?
You guys need to expand on this. Maybe a 20 min video. Alternatively (probably easier) an article going through this in detail and explaining some of the point that were only touched on.
I always thought it was because the earth takes a 360deg turn around it's axis so for the same time to come again next day, the earth would have taken a 360deg turn. When you divide 360deg (or pie) into equal sub-divisions you would get the time that we have today...24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds...
Numberphile does a great video called "60" which explains the Babylonian base 60 system with practical examples. The Babylonians counted their knuckles, not their fingers. That gives you 12 on a hand, and you use the other hand to count the number of 12's.
We use 60 minutes in an hour instead of 100 because: 1) We get it from the Sumerians who used base-60 arithmetic. 2) The Sumerians used base 60 because it has the most divisors of any number of that approximate size. 3) We continue to use it because 100 minutes has fewer divisors. 4) You can divide a 60-minute hour evenly by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10 or 12. 5) You can only divide a 100-minute decimal hour evenly by 2, 4, 5, or 10. 6) A 100-minute hour divided by 8 is 12.5 minutes; 1, 3, 4, 7 ,9, 11, and 12 result in infinite decimal places.
My theory; you heard it here first folks, 60 is the highest number that you can count to using your fingers and thumbs. Each of your fingers is separated by their joints into 3 sections. If you count both front and back, that equates to 6 sections per digit. Multiplied by 10 fingers, that totals 60. It strikes me that the other explanations are a bit too complex, but this is very simple. It would be very easy to point to a section on one of your fingers to easily communicate any number up to 60.
It's all about convenience. 60 divides into 60,30,20,15,12,10,6,5,4,3,2,1. 12 is used to tell the time for the same reason. 12 divides easily into more numbers than ten. It's simply more versatile.
You forgot to mention military time; still based on the same system only you don't have do mess with am or pm simply call each hour what it is after 12 noon go onto 13 14 and so on.
Somerandomdude4.2526 1:55 I used the words in the video and I'm on this website so it takes less effort to ask here, also I was hoping for brainstuff to react in order to verify that they know what they're talking about as they don't give an example.
Actually, notations in a Decimal Time system would be more simple and straightforward: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_time The main advantage of a decimal time system is that, since the base used to divide the time is the same as the one used to represent it, the whole time representation can be handled as a single string. Therefore, it becomes simpler to interpret a timestamp and to perform conversions. For instance, 1:23:00 is 1 decimal hour and 23 decimal minutes, or 1.23 hours, or 123 minutes; 3 hours is 300 minutes or 30,000 seconds. This property also makes it straightforward to represent a timestamp as a fractional day, so that 2016-12-12.534 can be interpreted as five decimal hours and 34 decimal minutes after the start of that day, or 0.534 (53.4%) of a day through that day. It also adjusts well to digital time representation using epochs, in that the internal time representation can be used directly both for computation and for user-facing display.
It's harder to count to 100, 60 is actually the perfect number, not too hard to count too but not too short to divide equally and still have a precise measurement of time.
I have a better explanation. One second is theduration in which cesium 133 atom vibrates 9192631770 times. It is an SI unit. Like other SI units, it also follows the decimal system; but when it comes to the rotation of the world around it's axis, it takes 216,000 seconds. Which is a factor of 60. 60x60x60.whatever atleast that is what I believe. Let's just say however it happened, it worked out pretty well.
also, 60 has more factors than 100, so it's easier to divide and hour in more easier to manage segments, or whole numbers... it also shares more factors with 24 (like 3,6 and 12)... just the same as why a circle has 360 degrees... it's easier to divide it in way more managable slices than it would be if it was divided in 1000 smaller slices. The ancient babylonians were on to something :)
Times and dates are a great way to teach kids the mathematical concept of "base". The seconds in a minute are counted using base 60. The minutes in an hour are counted using base 60. The hours in a half day are counted using base 12. The half days are counted using base 2 (AM and PM). The days in a month are counted using a variable base (28 to 31). The months in a year are counted using base 12 (January, February, etc.). The years are counted using base 10. Unfortunately, he didn't really give a great explanation about why base 60 is used other than being Sumerian. It isn't just 10 and 12 that 60 is divisible by. It's also 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 15, and 30, which makes subdividing hours that much easier. Base 10 is divisible only by 2 and 5.
If you count the joints on four of your fingers with your thumb, you get twelve.. do that on both hands and you get 24. seems pretty simple for people to figure out and count hours that way.
Decimal time would be the way to go: 10 decidays (hours) in a day, 100 centidays (minutes) in a deciday, 100 millidays (seconds) in a deciday. This was how French Revolutionary Time worked. There are 86.4 seconds in a milliday. As an Uber driver, I calculate my time in this method using a "Metric Clock" app, and it is SO much easier to add up millidays than having to carry a 6 converted to a 1 over to the hours slot in adding up time. And once I figure my pay in dollars per centiday, if I wanna convert that to dollars per hour, I multiply that by 2.4. But we will probably never use metric time in our lifetimes, if ever. As simple as it is to add up times and calculate, all it takes is some getting used to. I go by it for everything now. It's easy. There's 2:24'00" in 1dd. 2.50dd is 6am, 5.00dd is noon, 7.50dd is 6pm, 0.00dd is midnight. Fun facts>> It's important to get a full 3.33dd of sleep per night. Most of us work full 16.66dd work weeks. 9-5ers are now 3.75dd to 7.08dd-ers. TV shows can run on 20md time slots instead of 30 minute time slots. (20md = 28'48"). In the current 24:60 timekeeping method, you have forty-eight 30 minute time slots to work with for TV shows. With 20md being only 1'12" shorter than a full 30 minute slot, in decimal time, you could have fifty 20md time slots, opening up two more time slots for TV shows! For speed, we can't go by kilometers per hour anymore, and if you measure km/dd, it'd be too high of a number to fit practically on a car's instrument cluster, so the best unit to go by for metric time speed, in my opinion, is km/cd, or the "Kamcidee". (Remember, a centiday is 1/100 of a day, or 1/10 of a deciday, or kilometers per 14'24") Kamcidee 1 = 4.17km/h; Kamcidee 5 = 20.83km/h; Kamcidee 12 = 50km/h; Kamcidee 18 = 75km/h; Kamcidee 24 = 100km/h; Kamcidee 60 = 250km/h, etc. The time right now is currently 4.19dd. The date and time can be married in one notation: 2015/12/08.419. If you convert that to centidays, the time is 41.9cd, which means we're 41.9% through the day. How much percent of the day is left? 100-41.9=remaining percentage of day left. The advantages far outweigh the disadvantages as far as practical applications go. Alas, among people getting used to this system, other disadvantages would be having to re-write math formulas for various time-related equations, and the countless amount of dollars it would cost to manufacture new watches and clocks and that make all the other time pieces obsolete. Oh, and car speedometers since it would need to be in Kamcidees. If anything, what we COULD do is do away with minutes and have centihours (ch) and milihours (mh) for easier calculations and such.
As asked at the end of the video. If I could institute a new time system, I would do away with months, hours, and minutes; and just use years, Days, and seconds, which are themselves based on physical phenomenon. However I would write the years with 2 decimal places, to keep track of seasons; the day with 4 decimal places, to roughly keep track of scheduling; then for precise timing using seconds alone. Then you can convert units based on a given need. Say you’re at work at 126.300, then you take .500 to .520 for lunch (this gives you roughly 1800 seconds to work with), and you microwave your lunch for 180 seconds. I’ve found it kind of makes sense after you’ve used it for a while, but it’s hard to make any alternative time system intuitive if all you have is your computer that can use such a notation.
Computer Addic because at 3 decimal places gives it a relieve accuracy of two minutes, and it seemed to me that it would be more useful at a tenth more accurate. however the person using this system can easily be more or less accurate just by moving the decimal place around, however for most clocks 4 decimal places seems like a minimum benchmark to make it practical.
Also I forgot add that the format I suggested is mostly for earth time keeping; however days and years will have to be recalibrated for use on other planets with different lengths of seasons and days. However, in interstellar travel, days can be simplified to lengths of 100Ks and years to 10Ms.
I feel like the title question was avoided. This video, with proper segment cuts and editing, seemed like it was a spoken version of a last minute written assignment, with no outline, draft, or research. Or at least, the finished product gives off that kind of vibe.
I am sure that in some place in the universe (probably in our own galaxy) they count the time in a complete different way,that it would't make sense to us,but it does look perfectly normal to them. If the guy who desided to count time in 30,we would count it in 30 now ,soooooo....
Me neither ....for us Europeans a 10 hour day would make total sense. Why would you like to divide the day in 12ths instead of 10ths??? I guess that in the Us and brit countries with their 3/4, 5/8 , 6/11, 13/150 and other ridiculous day to day size fractions that still makes sense ...but here our 1/1, 1/10, 1/100, 1/1000 that does not make any sense.
I was wondering about this today actually. The problem for me is that the measuring of time itself seems to be the source of many of our anxieties, from being always in a hurry to determining how long we have left to live, it brings problems that we need to overcome. How I don't know, but I rely on the idea that solutions may arrive with the arrival of new technology, for instance we could have watches and automatic calenders which would know the time but not tell us, only reminded us that we should be on our way to something. When someone wanted to know the date and time there should be a way to do so, yes. We could go back to use the sun system, and I'm not sure about it but not counting our age at all could be a solution for a lot of things.
Hrmm... This video didn't really make it clear as to why 60 is prefered...other than it has advantages not quite discussed or elaborated upon. But...I can guess that many types of calenders and divisions were tried by many different types and someone along the lines had said "60/24/12 sounds good to me", and they were strong enough to make everyone else do it. And because it's been done that way for so long, old habits die hard. We still use AD and BC- basing a major division of recorded history on the birth of an- as yet- unproven figure called Jesus Christ.
We're just stuck with a bad system because at this point it is just easier to go on using a bad system than switch to a better one. If we could switch, a better system would be 10 hours in a day, 100 minutes in an hour, 100 seconds in a minute. The new second would be a little shorter than our second, so it would be more precise. The new minute would be about 1.44 times our minute, so we would use it pretty much the same way, but math would be infinitely easier when adding up minutes and hours. The new hour would be over twice as long as hour current hour, but it would be so much better. There would be no need to bother with AM and PM because you can easily fit 10 hours on a clock face. It would be much easier to deal with time zone differences that span the international date line ( not to mention no worry at all about time differences crossing the noon hour). Also, with only ten hours in the day, each hour can have its own distinct significance.
I think this topic needs more research and clarity. May I suggest you research the Ethiopian time and calendar system that is still used to this day. You may then better understand our system once you take it in context to Ethiopia.
The calendar is all sorts of fucked up. We had 10 months originally, with 304 days in a year, as they didn't account for the winter. It was said to have been made under the rule of king Romulus. Then by the time King Numa Pompilus came around, they reformed it for better seasonal alignment. they brought the number to 354 or 355 days. This made each of the months weirdly numbered, like for example we had months with 28, 29, and 31 days, but none with 30 for some stupid reason. In biblical numerology, the number 30 represents mourning and sadness. So maybe that's why they avoided 30? Anyways, now we have this shitty 28, 29, 30, and 31 day calendar we are stuck with, and January + February are both at the beginning of the year for some other stupid reason. This makes "Sept"ember the 9th month- FUCKING STUPID ASSHOLES, GOD DAMN! Fwew, relax... If I were to redesign the calendar, I would make it like this: 1 March - 30 2 April - 30 3 May - 31/32 as in, "may I please fucking account for leap years please?" 4 June - 30 5 July - 30 6 August - 31 7 September - 30 8 October - 30 9 November - 31 10 December- 30 11 January - 30 12 February - 31 You're probably wondering why I sprinkled 31 days in those odd placements right? That's so that the seasons line up; 1 day is added per season.
this may seem weird. but my theory is that sumerians or at least their rulers would measure time in multiples of 12 or even 6, because they had 6 fingers on each hand. that would be the only reason to do so. because every bit of it up to 24hrs can be divided by 5. our money, the metric system, everything we do everyday without even thinking about it is divisible by 5. if 12 hours is half a day....why isn't there a 12 dollar note, or a 60 dollar note. the imperial measurement system is even based off of 12. and before you discredit my theory, ask a 4 year old that has leaned to count and watch them use their fingers. sometimes the most simple answer is the answer. but its just a theory, until time travel is invented....
I heard someone said that Egyptians used the 24 hour system, then the Romans picked it up. Then all Europeans pick that up. Then the whole world uses it. There was a period of time when Greeks picked up Egyptian things for fashion, like girl's name Isis and things like that.
The true reason is building a clock you need cog wheels and you simply can't make a cog wheel with 33.3333333 teeth in it. The shortest way to divide the day in natural numbers or cog wheel teeth is 24-60-60.
i thought it had something to do with highly composite numbers. the thing that frustrates and confuses me the most about time is 12am and pm. why would anyone think its a good idea to set it up so that it goes from 11am to 12pm when any logical person would think 12am should be next and it should change to pm when the sequence resets to 1
I always thought the base 12 side of things came from the number of joints on one hands fingers, using the thumb as the counter. That meant to could count to twelve using only one hand, whereas counting ten fingers uses both hands.
So, here in Germany, they use the 24h rather than am/pm system and I find that people may get confused as to which is which! Also, ugh for the bg music on this. It's like the reason I usually played video games with the music off. :(
BrainStuff - HowStuffWorks *TLDR: use base 12 system to create calendars, time, and easier math in general.* If I were to institute a new time system, we would have to introduce the Dozenal system. Step 1: The hardest part -We would switch to the Dozenal system (base twelve) Using these symbols: 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,d,E, 10,11, ... d: ten, E: eleven, 10: twelve, (alternatively: dec, el, do) Step 2: We could continue by organizing time -A total year would have 265 or 266 days Since 360 in Decimal = 260 in Dozenal And, since the sun moves through space, you add 5-6 degrees -each year would have 4 seasons Start with spring, March, April, May, since life starts its cycle here. -each season would have 3 months -each month would have 26 days, (27 if at the end of a season) September, October, November are the 7th, 8th, 9th months -each day would have 10 hours ("twelve") instead of 20 ("two do", do as in "dozen"). -each hour would have 100 minutes. This would mean: 100 minutes = 1 hour 90 minutes = 3/4 hour 80 minutes = 2/3 hour 60 minutes = 1/2 hour 40 minutes = 1/3 hour 30 minutes = 1/4 hour 10 minutes = 1/6 hour -each hour, minute, second, millisecond, etc. and subsequent would have 100. If we were to start on March 20, 2014, this would happen: -March 20 would change to March 1st (it’d be the “Déjà vu new year”) -The year would be 11EE AD Since do=10, gra=100, meg=1,000, bi-meg=10,000 Than we would read: 11EE= “meg gra el-do el”: like how we would say, “one thousand, one hundred, ninety nine” Or, “do gra, el-do el”: like how we would say, “eleven ninety nine” If that last part is unappealing, I understand, I’d love to hear alternative names for Dozenal numerals. The standard is an illogical, “do, gro, mo” = 10, 100, 100 I changed that to, “do, gra, meg” to prevent confusion in phonetics.
Actually we do know the reason why. Writing appeared in Mesopotamia (now south Iraq),representing a now dead language known as “Sumerian”. Check out morphemes. That will pretty much sum (no pun intended) up the reason why and how it spread around the World. I hope you're having a great day...86,400 seconds of them...depending on one way of measuring one complete orbit of the Earth.
In a lack of better words they did. However it was poorly implemented compared to the rest of the Metric system; and it also carried over the same names such as the hours, minutes and seconds which led to such confusion that derailed the whole idea. However decimal time is used in certain specialized fields; the regular second was declared the official unit of time so it's often used in general science most computers usually have a clock that counts the seconds from a given time period, or NASA keeps track of space missions in seconds from launch to landing; and astronomers keep track of space events and objects using a Julian day number, which includes a decimal unit for the time of day.
No one should ever use AM and PM, it adds another dimension of complexity that doesn't need to be there. Why would you want to have to double check your flight time, alarm clock, friend on other side if the world for AM/PM when 24hour time could be used. When your flight leaves at 12am you have to try think is that midnight or midday, where as 0000 is obviously midnight and 1200 is obviously midday.
If I could institute a new time system, it would be a calendar, actually. I would divide each year into 13 months of 28 days, with an extra day just in its own. Like a roman holiday. And insert leap days as we do now, but at the end of the year. Also, may as well make the year start on the northern winter solstice.
Duh!!! The reason time is measured on units of 60 was simply due to the measurements used by the ancient Sumerian‘s. The four fingers on one hand each have three joints, equating to 12, when multiplied by five, (being four fingers and the thumb) this became 60. The Sumerian‘s considered this to be a divine number, consequently units of 60 as a measurement of time are also found in trigonometry.
The only same number that is less than 100 that ends in even numbers are 20 40 60. So 86400 seconds in 20 second minutes and 20 minute hours gives you 54 hours a day. All other base 10 numbers have a remainder, and unless you want a leap day every week it doesn't work out right. Going much above 60 seconds in a minute would make the minutes too long and you would have to have half minutes and quarter minutes to keep people sane. Using a base 10 system for time would have to devise a different time scheme than seconds, minutes and hours.
I tried to invent a 10-Hour clock for a day on Jupiter... Nobody knew how to modify the gears to make the hour hand rotate every 10 hours instead instead of 12. Since it was easier than a 24 hour clock, (12 is closer to 10 than 24,) I had the background go from 1 to 10, and minutes go 6, 12, 18, 24, 30 and so on. Earth days are 23:56, and Jupiter's are 9:56. Could someone do a clock like that? If it's already on the internet, where do I download it? Thank you.
Why have we not gone to a thirteen 4 week (7 day) system starting on a Monday with a leap day and Old Year Day at the end? Is it for reasons of conversion cost, stubbornness, superstition, religion, fighting when what day of week to start, or other? Would it mean the end of printing new calendars? No one wants to fight over month names? (Start on a Sunday and get Friday the 13th every month, and Christmas would always come on a Wednesday.) :-) Personally, I like the idea of an Old Year Day as a final salute to the old year. Thanks for the video.
I was more referring to the beginning of this video where he goes over the definition of a day an time. In brainstuff they talk about fractions of fractions and vsause explains that that isn't accurate.
