Beat the clock or Clock the beat

As theatened, here is my proposal for a revamped calander.

Their are 365.242199 days in a year, which works out to the familiar 365 days with an aditional 'leap day' every fourth year (with a give-or-take 'leap second' as needed). Now 360 is a great number, if only because it is equally divisable by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, and 12 (unconfimed note: i believe this was the reason for choosing to divide circles into 360 degrees rather than a decimal 100). There are four seasons, so the best choice for number of months would be 4, 8, or 12. 4 is to few, so 8 or 12. I think sticking with 12 months would be best, although i do have an alternate plan for 8 month to a year.

12 months means 30 days a month, and 120 days a season (don't worry, i haven't forgotten about those five extra days). The 30 days could be divided into weeks a number of ways, but i would suggest a 9 day week. For working purposes i would subsequently suggest 6 on/3 off  schedule (which would mean a 4.76%  loss of  time worked, however this is not very apparent and might be offset by increased productivity due to the idea of a standard three day weekend - which is apparent). Besides, it seems to have a certain symmetry (me likey symmetry), we sleep for one third of the day, so why not 'rest' from work one third of the week?

The five remaining days would not belong to any month or week (they wouldn't be a Monday, Tuesday, etc., but they would each have there own name). I would position them one each at the spring and autumnal equinoxes (sp?), one before and after the winter solsitice (last and first days of the year), and one on the summer solsitice with the 'leap' day be added to the summer solsitice to make it before and after as well. These days would be considered holidays for work purposes.

I would rename the months as well, the mathematician in me says name them on latin or greek number roots, but the less-mathimatical side wants to name them after the constellations that would be in the night sky at the appropriate time, of course that would only be true for one hemisphere or the other, so i suppose the number based system would be more universal (hah, how ironic :) ). Further i would probably name the days of the weeks on number roots as well, perhaps latin if the months used greek or vice versa.

The obvious choice for starting the year would be either of the solsitices, winter being traditional,so, no need to change that. Now the arbitrary part, when to begin the calander years - when would year zero be.  With that in mind the choices should also be on a winter solstice, which means an astrological event. Doing some quick web research i found that 0n the 2001 winter solstice the Earth's, Sun's, and Moon's axis were in alignment with the galactic plane, a truely rare occasion - once every 26,000 years! (i know, i'm pissed that i missed it too) This would be ideal except that it just happened, and calling 2001 the zero year is waaaay to close, and starting year zero 26,000 years ago is waaay to long ago. Without doing more research at this time perhaps a simple alignment of the Earth, Sun, and Moon (also known as an eclipse) on the winter solstice would suffice. Anyway like I said this would be rather arbitrary and there are probably several choices that need only fit a few criteria to be acceptable. Suggestion welcome here.

Now, per tom's suggestion, the days and their hours, minutes, and seconds. A day has 24 hours, 1440 minutes, or 86,400 seconds. First, a 'day' is divided into two 'parts' - a day and a night; next it is also divided into 'cycles' - a rest cycle, a work cycle, and a play (for lack of a better word) cycle; third it is also divided into 4 'stages' - morning, day, evening, and night.

I like the idea of decimal time from both the french revolution period and, more currently, the Swatch/Internet/Fractional time. My first instinct is to go with the 1000 'beats' per day, there are 86,400 sec. in a day, so that makes a beat 86.4 seconds - roughly equivelent to a minute. That would make 500 beats of both light and dark in a day, and 250 beats per stage, regretably it makes a cycle 333.33... beats. The beat would become the standard unit of time - replacing the second - it would have the standard prefixes: millibeat, dekabeat, gigabeat :), etc. and would be rigously defined. I could easily see a future were somebody says "Give me a cent." instead of "Give me a sec." cent. being short for centibeat ( see doesn't centibeat just skip right off the tongue :) ).

Another alternative would be to devided the day into 12 'periods' - making stages 3 periods long and cycles 4 - then divide each period into 100 'beats' (different beats than the previous). Each period would be equal to two hours, and that would make these beats equal to 72 seconds - again roughly equal to a minute. That would make a day 1200 beats long, a stage 300, and a cycle 400. Prefixes and definition would still need apply ( i guess that would make a day 1.2 kilobeats).

Further note, beat to me seams more like a second - like beats in music, plus it is very similar in sound to bits or bytes which might cause some confusion. So, another name may me neccisarry.

Well, what do y'all think. Suggestions, refinedments, additions, go to hell's? :)

Comments

[Lance]

Mark a chart or graphic.

Would our modern lifestyle and work tradition accept your new system? Meaning... would employers still get their 40 hour-work-weeks? 'Cause some employers don't like the 9 days for 80 hours with a 3-day weekend every other week.

[MathJames]

Employers would get a 6 day, 48 hour work week from employees, and employees would get a 3 day weekend.

chart:

1 beat = 0.72 seconds

1000 beats in a period
12 periods in a day
30 days in a month
3 months in a season
4 seasons [+5(or 6)days] in a year

Weeks are 9 days and there are 10 weeks to a season and 40 weeks [+5(or6) days] to a year.

There are 3 cycles in a day each 4 periods or 4000 beats long (4 kilobeats).
There are 4 stages in a day each 3 periods or 3000 beats long (3 kilobeats).

The year begins the day after winter solstice and ends the day befor or on winter solstice. Year zero would be some year when a solar eclipse coincided with a winter solstice (although i'm not 100% sold on this idea).

i think that recaps it all.

[Ojo Rojo]

I really like your ideas. I especially like the nine day week that would allow 6 days on, 3 days off. The overall loss of work time is small. Plus, increasing the work week by a day would allow people to focus on work for a longer stretch without being interrupted by a weekend. Then, when the weekend does come, it is 33% longer than before. The only realy substantive change I would make to your system (I agree with all naming systems, year starting times, etc. that you've suggested) is that I would bunch all five days together, probably between summer and fall, into one 5-day long superweekend. It would be the biggest party of the year - festivals, parties, etc. As you suggested, they should have a different name than all of the other days - something that means "Happy Day" or "Joyous Day" and be numbered 1-5. All sorts of new traditions would be created. For example: Happy Day #5 would be traditionally a day of sleeping late, brunches and mimosas, followed by naps. It could even have a nickname - Recovery Day.

[MathJames]

Thanks.

I don't know about the "super weekend" idea. Sounds like an idea from a graduating law student to me. :)

Actually, i had considered it, but i just don't think it would work economically. Depending on if you place the 5 days befor or after a normal weekend it would actually be an 8 day weekend!. Government facilities, businesses, and especially banks simply could not stay closed that long. However the 2 days at the end/begining of the year are automatically at the end of a week so you would get a 5 day weekend after all, and the others are at the end of a week naturally as well. Wow, this is a pretty cool system - that was really easy to figure.