The radical plan to destroy time zones

[Hobart]

Now that the thread is bumped, and I know it exists, I'll pitch in my two cents:

Time zones don't technically need to exist, but they'd totally be a pain to remove for little benefit, so it isn't worth it. The only reason we have them is because noon is associated with the sun being highest in the sky; any old time could have been assigned to it besides 12 PM.

If a child grew up in an environment where the sun came up at 7 PM everyday and set at 11 AM, they'd get used to it; it would be normal for them. Therefore, if different parts of the world do this, we can all run on one time system; it's just that the personal definition of sunset and sunrise changes based on where a person is. It would cost tons of money and nobody would want to do this, so it probably won't happen.

Time is very real, but the number we start counting from is arbitrary.

[Scott5114]

Time is very real, but the number we start counting from is arbitrary.

I have been told from people that were there that January 1, 1970, was, in fact, very real.

[kalvado]

Time is very real, but the number we start counting from is arbitrary.

I have been told from people that were there that January 1, 1970, was, in fact, very real.

But there was nothing before that!

[kalvado]

I'll be surprised if anyone gets the reference I was going for, admittedly it is obscure.  But if we want to turn this into conversation about GR or a possibly Grand Unified Theory it might be interesting.

You don't need to go that far. Even special relativity considers time as a local variable. A lot of consideration is given to the concept of "simultaneous" - which doesn't work even in special relativity.
So it makes total sense to assign different local clock settings to areas moving with respect to each other - and areas on the earth surface experience relative moves due to planet rotation.
we do properly account for that fact in longitude by introducing time zones, but that is not the case for latitude.
as it was pointed out in many DST threads, seasonal effects are more pronounced closer to poles and less so near the equator.  So to account for time dilation in latitudal direction, DST zones can be introduced in N-S direction, with 0 DST change near the equator, 1 hour further north, and possibly 2 and even 3 hours of DST up there.
Zis iz sajens in action!

[MikeTheActuary]

Therefore, if different parts of the world do this, we can all run on one time system; it's just that the personal definition of sunset and sunrise changes based on where a person is. It would cost tons of money and nobody would want to do this, so it probably won't happen.

Probably the two biggest stumbling blocks to abolishing time zones are:

• Potential headaches if the date changes during "waking hours".  In some places, if you have a meeting on "Wednesday" the functional day that the meeting occurs will depend on the hour associated with that Wednesday meeting.
  
• Many people in Western societies have near-religious belief in that certain things should happen when certain numbers appear on the clock.  Lunch should be at noon.  Carson should be on at 10:30 or 11:30pm.  Et cetera.  Such arguments always prove to be an obstacle whenever the potential abolition of DST is discussed.
  

Members of my team at work can be found in India, England, eastern North America, and British Columbia.  Coordinating meetings would be MUCH easier if we were on a common time zone (or if folks were more conversant in UTC, at least).  However, awareness of local time zones does come in handy when evaluating whether a meeting time is "too early" or "too late" for some folks.

[kalvado]

Therefore, if different parts of the world do this, we can all run on one time system; it's just that the personal definition of sunset and sunrise changes based on where a person is. It would cost tons of money and nobody would want to do this, so it probably won't happen.

Probably the two biggest stumbling blocks to abolishing time zones are:

• Potential headaches if the date changes during "waking hours".  In some places, if you have a meeting on "Wednesday" the functional day that the meeting occurs will depend on the hour associated with that Wednesday meeting.
  
• Many people in Western societies have near-religious belief in that certain things should happen when certain numbers appear on the clock.  Lunch should be at noon.  Carson should be on at 10:30 or 11:30pm.  Et cetera.  Such arguments always prove to be an obstacle whenever the potential abolition of DST is discussed.
  

Members of my team at work can be found in India, England, eastern North America, and British Columbia.  Coordinating meetings would be MUCH easier if we were on a common time zone (or if folks were more conversant in UTC, at least).  However, awareness of local time zones does come in handy when evaluating whether a meeting time is "too early" or "too late" for some folks.

In terms of "waking hours", you can get down to 2 or 3 time zones. Two major dividers, Atlantic and Pacific, make placing those "time superzone" boundaries relatively easy so that date change occurs during "sleeping hours". Those who are working night shifts may deal with date change anyway. 
At least, having single time zone for Americas isn't totally crazy from my perspective.

[tmoore952]

Therefore, if different parts of the world do this, we can all run on one time system; it's just that the personal definition of sunset and sunrise changes based on where a person is. It would cost tons of money and nobody would want to do this, so it probably won't happen.

Probably the two biggest stumbling blocks to abolishing time zones are:

• Potential headaches if the date changes during "waking hours".  In some places, if you have a meeting on "Wednesday" the functional day that the meeting occurs will depend on the hour associated with that Wednesday meeting.
  
• Many people in Western societies have near-religious belief in that certain things should happen when certain numbers appear on the clock.  Lunch should be at noon.  Carson should be on at 10:30 or 11:30pm.  Et cetera.  Such arguments always prove to be an obstacle whenever the potential abolition of DST is discussed.
  

Members of my team at work can be found in India, England, eastern North America, and British Columbia.  Coordinating meetings would be MUCH easier if we were on a common time zone (or if folks were more conversant in UTC, at least).  However, awareness of local time zones does come in handy when evaluating whether a meeting time is "too early" or "too late" for some folks.

In terms of "waking hours", you can get down to 2 or 3 time zones. Two major dividers, Atlantic and Pacific, make placing those "time superzone" boundaries relatively easy so that date change occurs during "sleeping hours". Those who are working night shifts may deal with date change anyway. 
At least, having single time zone for Americas isn't totally crazy from my perspective.

My experiences traveling in Alaska is that they have one time zone for the entire state. At their far northern latitude, and all the way down the panhandle.

And IIRC, it's the same way in China, which is comparable to the lower 48 in E-W extent.

[citrus]

In terms of "waking hours", you can get down to 2 or 3 time zones. Two major dividers, Atlantic and Pacific, make placing those "time superzone" boundaries relatively easy so that date change occurs during "sleeping hours". Those who are working night shifts may deal with date change anyway. 
At least, having single time zone for Americas isn't totally crazy from my perspective.

The BeReal social media app, which is based on prompting everyone at the same time to take a picture, effectively has four time zones: Americas, Europe, West Asia, and East Asia.

[kkt]

Now that the thread is bumped, and I know it exists, I'll pitch in my two cents:

Time zones don't technically need to exist, but they'd totally be a pain to remove for little benefit, so it isn't worth it. The only reason we have them is because noon is associated with the sun being highest in the sky; any old time could have been assigned to it besides 12 PM.

If a child grew up in an environment where the sun came up at 7 PM everyday and set at 11 AM, they'd get used to it; it would be normal for them. Therefore, if different parts of the world do this, we can all run on one time system; it's just that the personal definition of sunset and sunrise changes based on where a person is. It would cost tons of money and nobody would want to do this, so it probably won't happen.

Time is very real, but the number we start counting from is arbitrary.

Instead of looking up what time it is at whatever other longitude I might need to telephone, instead I'd have to look up when to call them when they're not asleep or at work.  Little gain there.

[GaryV]

Members of my team at work can be found in India, England, eastern North America, and British Columbia.  Coordinating meetings would be MUCH easier if we were on a common time zone (or if folks were more conversant in UTC, at least).  However, awareness of local time zones does come in handy when evaluating whether a meeting time is "too early" or "too late" for some folks.

I worked in a company with offices in Michigan, Pennsylvania, California and India. When people from all areas needed to be in a meeting, we scheduled it for 10:00 Eastern time. It didn't matter what the clock said - it could have said 1300 or 1400 Zulu. But that wouldn't change the fact that those in CA would be attending just as daylight started, and those in India just as daylight ended, or at least not "too long" past that. Assuming that most people work in daylight hours, this was a compromise on the part of the Indian office that they could stay late for meetings when needed, but not "too late".

[kkt]

Companies and organizations that operate worldwide often use UTC for many purposes.  Computer networks, the military, airlines that fly internationally, astronomers...

[kphoger]

Members of my team at work can be found in India, England, eastern North America, and British Columbia.  Coordinating meetings would be MUCH easier if we were on a common time zone (or if folks were more conversant in UTC, at least).  However, awareness of local time zones does come in handy when evaluating whether a meeting time is "too early" or "too late" for some folks.

I worked in a company with offices in Michigan, Pennsylvania, California and India. When people from all areas needed to be in a meeting, we scheduled it for 10:00 Eastern time. It didn't matter what the clock said - it could have said 1300 or 1400 Zulu. But that wouldn't change the fact that those in CA would be attending just as daylight started, and those in India just as daylight ended, or at least not "too long" past that. Assuming that most people work in daylight hours, this was a compromise on the part of the Indian office that they could stay late for meetings when needed, but not "too late".

At my work, dispatch was outsourced to India several years ago.  That whole department serves the needs of customers like us in the USA.  So they operate by hours that work out great in the USA but must be awful in India:  normal hours of operation are in the middle of the night for them.

[CNGL-Leudimin]

Do Spanish start work at a later hours, like 10 or 11am?

Holy moly, you quoted a post from almost 7 years before you registered. At the time I didn't have a job, but now I do and I enter at 8 am, so nothing from the other world. Some shops don't open until 10 am as you said.

In the meantime I decided to ditch the "forum time" and now I use my time zone. I thus keep track of Big Rig Steve using it (e.g. he says he has a delivery appointment at 2 p.m. Central, I echo that as 9 p.m. Central Europe). This also allows me to show no actual time travel occurs at the "spacetime rifts" (i.e. time zone boundaries), and no paradoxes occur either (i.e when a stream crosses a time zone boundary Westbound less than one hour after starting or before ending).

[LilianaUwU]

inb4 lock

[Max Rockatansky]

If we are destroying time zones couldn't you just go back before the lock whenever you wanted?  That or pulling the pre-locked thread forward through time to exist paradoxically with the locked iteration?

[kphoger]

inb4 lock

I say we put all of North America on a single time zone, but then let each individual state choose from a goody bag of DST variations.  New Jersey gets to be on NAST+DST1, while Oregon gets to be on NAST+DST4.

[Billy F 1988]

Oh, brother! I'll just go with a handy handheld sun dial, thx!

[geek11111]

Therefore, if different parts of the world do this, we can all run on one time system; it's just that the personal definition of sunset and sunrise changes based on where a person is. It would cost tons of money and nobody would want to do this, so it probably won't happen.

Probably the two biggest stumbling blocks to abolishing time zones are:

   
• Potential headaches if the date changes during "waking hours".  In some places, if you have a meeting on "Wednesday" the functional day that the meeting occurs will depend on the hour associated with that Wednesday meeting.
• Many people in Western societies have near-religious belief in that certain things should happen when certain numbers appear on the clock.  Lunch should be at noon.  Carson should be on at 10:30 or 11:30pm.  Et cetera.  Such arguments always prove to be an obstacle whenever the potential abolition of DST is discussed.

Members of my team at work can be found in India, England, eastern North America, and British Columbia.  Coordinating meetings would be MUCH easier if we were on a common time zone (or if folks were more conversant in UTC, at least).  However, awareness of local time zones does come in handy when evaluating whether a meeting time is "too early" or "too late" for some folks.

In terms of "waking hours", you can get down to 2 or 3 time zones. Two major dividers, Atlantic and Pacific, make placing those "time superzone" boundaries relatively easy so that date change occurs during "sleeping hours". Those who are working night shifts may deal with date change anyway. 
At least, having single time zone for Americas isn't totally crazy from my perspective.

My experiences traveling in Alaska is that they have one time zone for the entire state. At their far northern latitude, and all the way down the panhandle.

And IIRC, it's the same way in China, which is comparable to the lower 48 in E-W extent.

China nominally has one but, in practice, they have two. The second one is 2 hours behind the so-called China standard time.
In far west China, people shift schedule two hours behind. So their business hours are 10 to 8, lunch break is 2 to 4, and go to bed at 12 to 1 AM.
This is essentially like working from 8-6, lunch from 12-2, go to bed at 10-11.

[vdeane]

I propose that instead of standardizing time zones, we instead let every property have its own.  Own a house?  Congratulations, you get to set a time zone (down to the second, if you want)!  Go to work?  Your employer sets the time there.  At a business?  The owner sets the time zone while you shop.  Rent?  Your landlord is time god.

This will work because everyone has smartphones.

[kalvado]

I propose that instead of standardizing time zones, we instead let every property have its own.  Own a house?  Congratulations, you get to set a time zone (down to the second, if you want)!  Go to work?  Your employer sets the time there.  At a business?  The owner sets the time zone while you shop.  Rent?  Your landlord is time god.

This will work because everyone has smartphones.

Landlord: now we have 20 days months and 240 day years. Congratulations, you rent went down by 2% a year!

[1995hoo]

I propose that instead of standardizing time zones, we instead let every property have its own.  Own a house?  Congratulations, you get to set a time zone (down to the second, if you want)!  Go to work?  Your employer sets the time there.  At a business?  The owner sets the time zone while you shop.  Rent?  Your landlord is time god.

This will work because everyone has smartphones.

Sounds like the time Kramer decided not to wait for DST and just set his watch ahead immediately.

[Scott5114]

inb4 lock

I say we put all of North America on a single time zone, but then let each individual state choose from a goody bag of DST variations.  New Jersey gets to be on NAST+DST1, while Oregon gets to be on NAST+DST4.

How About having the North American Time Zone System, in all 15 North American countries, the time zones will be, the U.S., Mexico, Canada, Alaska, Yukon, Northwest Terrtiories, Nunavut, Quebec, Greenland, Iceland, Alanland, Hawaii, Bermuda, Belize, and Saint Pierre and Miquelon, not central america, caribbean, or south america because i considered them other continents, and i would also like to have to have the time zone system in Europe and Australia, in Europe will have them in every country, like the UK, France or Spain, and in Australia will have them also in every country, like in Australia (Nation), or New Zealand, and this time zones can also be in Antarctica, and maybe South Africa, because in Antarctica theres only 1 or 2 countries, and about 5 or 6 Territories, and in South Africa because it looks like Europe, Australia, or North America, and those continents like North America, Europe, and Australia do look alike along with Antarctica and South Africa, theres my plan

[freebrickproductions]

inb4 lock

I say we put all of North America on a single time zone, but then let each individual state choose from a goody bag of DST variations.  New Jersey gets to be on NAST+DST1, while Oregon gets to be on NAST+DST4.

How About having the North American Time Zone System, in all 15 North American countries, the time zones will be, the U.S., Mexico, Canada, Alaska, Yukon, Northwest Terrtiories, Nunavut, Quebec, Greenland, Iceland, Alanland, Hawaii, Bermuda, Belize, and Saint Pierre and Miquelon, not central america, caribbean, or south america because i considered them other continents, and i would also like to have to have the time zone system in Europe and Australia, in Europe will have them in every country, like the UK, France or Spain, and in Australia will have them also in every country, like in Australia (Nation), or New Zealand, and this time zones can also be in Antarctica, and maybe South Africa, because in Antarctica theres only 1 or 2 countries, and about 5 or 6 Territories, and in South Africa because it looks like Europe, Australia, or North America, and those continents like North America, Europe, and Australia do look alike along with Antarctica and South Africa, theres my plan

Would go well with an interstate highway system through all of the countries too.

[Max Rockatansky]

I'm opposed to removing AST (Alan Standard Time).

[kphoger]

How About having the North American Time Zone System, in all 15 North American countries, the time zones will be, the U.S., Mexico, Canada, Alaska, Yukon, Northwest Terrtiories, Nunavut, Quebec, Greenland, Iceland, Alanland, Hawaii, Bermuda, Belize, and Saint Pierre and Miquelon, not central america, caribbean, or south america because i considered them other continents, and i would also like to have to have the time zone system in Europe and Australia, in Europe will have them in every country, like the UK, France or Spain, and in Australia will have them also in every country, like in Australia (Nation), or New Zealand, and this time zones can also be in Antarctica, and maybe South Africa, because in Antarctica theres only 1 or 2 countries, and about 5 or 6 Territories, and in South Africa because it looks like Europe, Australia, or North America, and those continents like North America, Europe, and Australia do look alike along with Antarctica and South Africa, theres my plan

You should start a separate thread about that.